iiiuj>niiiiiii  iiiniiiii 


THE  LIBRARY 

OF 

THE  UNIVERSITY 

OF  CALIFORNIA 

LOS  ANGELES 

GIFT  OF 


Clark  J.  Mil]  iron 


WILLIAM    STANTON,    IN    IQOO 


A  MEMOIR  OF 
WILLIAM  A.  STANTON,  S.J. 


BY 

WILLIAM  T.  KANE,  S.J. 


WITH  AN  INTRODUCTION  BY 

THE  MOST  REVEREND  J.  J.   HARTY,  D.D. 

Archbishof  of  Omaha 


B.  HERDER  BOOK  CO. 

17  South  Broadway,  St.  Louis,  Mo. 

AND 

68  Great  Russell  St.  London,  W.  C. 
1918 


IMPRIMI  POTEST 

A.  J.  Burr  owes,  SJ. 
Praep.  Prov. 

NIHIL  OB  ST  AT 
Sti.  Ludovici,  die  7.  Jan.  1918 

F.  G.  Holweck, 

Censor  Librorum 

IMPRIMATUR 
Sti.  Ludovici,  die  12.  Jan.  IQ18 

'i'Joannes  J.  Glennon, 
Archiepiscopus 

Sti.  Ludovici 

Copyright,  ipi8 

by 

Joseph  Gummersbach 

All  rights  reserved 

Printed  in  U.  S.  A. 


3X 


TO 

MARY  REGINA  DIMICK 

TO  WHOM  IN  EVERY  WAY 

IT  OWES  MOST 

THIS  MEMOIR 

IS  AFFECTIONATELY 

DEDICATED 


825525 


AUTHOR'S  PREFACE 

When  we  take  up  a  work  of  biography  to 
read,  we  find,  ordinarily,  that  it  is  the  story  of  a 
man  whose  name  at  least  we  have  known  before. 
The  title  page  is  vaguely  reminiscent.  The  man's 
name  brings  up  sketchy  memories.  He  figured 
largely  in  such  and  such  a  war;  he  wrote  such 
and  such  books;  he  was  a  statesman  of  such  and 
such  a  period  of  history,  or  a  poet,  or  a  notable 
rascal,  or  the  brewer  of  a  noble  beer,  or  a  suc- 
cessful usurer  who  held  a  high  place  in  the  coun- 
cils of  government;  possibly  (and  most  vaguely 
of  all  to  us)  he  was  a  saint.  But  he  comes  be- 
fore us  in  the  book  with  some  credentials  of  his- 
tory, with  a  letter  of  introduction  which  he  himself 
wrote  upon  the  fading  tablets  of  time.  We  set  our- 
selves to  read  with  a  sense  of  being  about  to  enlarge 
upon  an  acquaintance  we  have  already  made.  We 
are  keeping  the  convention  of  polite  society  in  not 
venturing  beyond  the  circle  of  the  properly  intro- 
duced. 


AUTHOR'S  PREFACE 

Heaven  defend  us  from  decrying  that  convention, 
whether  in  Hfe  or  in  books.  No  doubt  it  serves  a 
good  purpose.  But  heaven  defend  us  more  stoutly 
still  from  becoming  its  bondmen.  He  has  not 
savoured  life  fully  who  has  never  welcomed  an  un- 
known comrade  in  the  way,  who  has  never  stepped 
out  stride  for  stride  with  one  whose  sole  known 
credentials  were  his  sonship  of  Adam  and  the  image 
of  God  in  his  soul.  The  high  romance  and  sweeping 
adventure  of  life  lies  not  alone  on  strange  moun- 
tains or  in  uncharted  seas;  it  is  often  upon  the  road 
before  our  doors;  it  is  in  the  faces  and  hearts  of 
unheralded  pilgrims  who  meet  up  with  us  on  our 
plodding  way. 

I  remember  a  man  once  saying  that  he  considered 
the  most  delightful  avocation  in  the  world  to  be  that 
of  an  agent  of  Baedeker's.  He  grew  quite  rhapso- 
dic about  it :  to  wander  about  this  good  earth,  fer- 
reting out  its  beauties,  noting  places  of  interest,  dis- 
covering hidden  nooks  and  corners  full  of  charm 
and  nobility  and  restful  hotels  with  French  chefs, 
and  bringing  all  these  nice  things  to  the  notice  of 
grateful  travellers.  I  doubt  if  he  knew  much  of 
what  he  was  talking  about:  yet,  let  us  grant,  there 
may  be  something  in  his  idea.  But  there  is  an  in- 
comparably finer  search  open  to  men.     For  just  as 


AUTHOR'S  PREFACE 

in  the  material  world  there  are  secret  haunts  of 
beauty  and  delight,  so  also  in  the  world  of  men  God 
makes  fine  fellows  whom  we  must  hunt  out  for 
ourselves,  who  sound  no  great  trumpet  in  life,  who 
will  not  catch  our  eye  by  any  civic  monument  or 
gleaming  halo  when  they  are  dead,  nor  have  even  the 
meagre  credit  of  an  advocatiis  diaboli:  but  whom  it 
is  a  matter  of  pride  for  us  to  have  known  and  loved. 

Of  the  number  of  such  was  William  Stanton, 
whom  you,  most  amiable  reader,  in  all  likelihood 
never  so  much  as  heard  of.  But  if  you  read  this 
book  bravely  and  persistently,  despising  all  queru- 
lousness  of  the  flesh,  I  promise  you  that  you  shall 
at  least  know  something  of  him;  and  I  hope  that 
even  under  the  poverty  of  my  presentation  you  may 
catch  some  gleam  of  his  fine  gold. 

Father  Stanton  was  a  young  Jesuit  priest.  He 
died  when  he  was  only  forty  years  old.  He  had 
done  but  ten  or  twelve  years  of  actual  work  in  his 
Jesuit  career,  and  that  for  the  most  part  away  off  in 
half-barbaric  places  where  the  spot-light  does  not 
reach.  He  would  have  been  most  hugely  amused 
over  the  notion  that  any  one  should  make  a  sort  of 
hero  of  him:  and  he  might  have  beaten  me  about 
the  head  with  this  book,  had  it  come  into  his  hands. 
Yet  for  all  that,  a  heroic  man  he  was,  and  rather 


AUTHOR'S  PREFACE 

particularly  (I  like  to  believe)  the  kind  of  heroic 
man  that  our  temper  of  to-day  most  delights  in :  a 
man  who,  with  an  easy  grin  and  an  utter  lack  of  pose 
or  self -consciousness,  made  enormous  personal 
sacrifices  and  underwent  constant  hardships  for  a 
great  cause;  a  great,  generous  man,  with  the  heart 
of  a  boy,  the  physique  of  an  athlete,  the  intellectual 
gifts  of  a  real  scientist,  and  the  faith  of  a  Breton 
peasant  woman.  He  was  the  sort  of  man  whose 
very  existence  makes  us  think  better  of  humanity, 
makes  us  think  better  even  of  ourselves :  for  with 
all  his  fineness  he  was  very  close  to  the  commonest 
of  us. 

It  is  in  the  certain  confidence  that  many  will  be 
glad  to  know  such  a  man,  and  in  the  hope  that  some 
will  be  encouraged  to  imitate  him,  that  I  have  writ- 
ten this  little  book. 

I  wish  to  make  grateful  acknowledgment  to  the 
relatives  and  comrades  of  Fr.  Stanton,  who,  often 
with  considerable  inconvenience  to  themselves,  have 
generously  supplied  me  with  the  material  for  this 
memoir. 


INTRODUCTION 

I  had  known  the  subject  of  this  memoir  from  his 
boyhood.  I  had  known  well,  back  in  St.  Louis,  the 
splendid  Catholic  families  from  which  he  sprung. 
When  I  came  to  Manila  in  1904,  I  found  Father 
Stanton  already  a  figure  of  note  in  the  island  capi- 
tal. He  had  the  distinction  of  being  the  first  Amer- 
ican to  be  ordained  a  priest  in  the  Philippines  under 
the  American  regime.  He  had  the  more  enviable 
distinction  of  holding  the  high  regard  and  warm 
affection  of  all  who  knew  him. 

His  position  as  the  first  American  priest  ordained 
in  Manila  gave  him  a  really  important  influence.  In 
the  chaotic  conditions  resulting  upon  the  changed 
relations  of  Church  and  State  in  the  Islands,  he  was 
a  visible  link  between  the  old  and  the  new ;  between 
the  spiritual  existence  that  dated  back  to  the  coming 
of  the  Spaniards,  three  hundred  and  fifty  years  be- 
fore, and  the  new  civil  rule  of  the  Americans.  And 
his  beautiful  gifts  of  character  enabled  him  to  use 
that  influence  for  an  immense  good.     His  services, 


INTRODUCTION 

at  a  time  when  the  need  of  them  was  so  great,  were 
most  valuable.  His  fine  poise  of  character,  his 
smiling,  kindly  common-sense,  smoothed  over  many 
a  difficulty,  for  his  fellow-religious,  for  Spaniard 
and  American  and  Filipino  alike. 

The  Jesuit  Observatory  in  Manila  had  been  taken 
over  by  the  new  government,  and  its  officials  re- 
ceived salaries  from  the  government.  But  the 
American  voucher  system  puzzled  the  good  Spanish 
padres,  and  gave  them  such  scruples  and  fears  of 
violating  religious  poverty  that  they  were  on  the 
verge  of  relinquishing  their  fine  work  altogether. 
Stanton  steadied  them,  and  in  his  easy,  drawling 
way  made  the  situation  at  least  clear  enough  to  get 
them  to  sign  the  salary-vouchers  and  continue  with 
their  work. 

He  was  welcomed  by  the  American  residents, 
whom  he  gathered  with  some  others  to  form  an 
English-speaking  congregation  at  the  church  of  La 
Ermita.  The  soldiers  at  the  barracks  idolized  him. 
The  Filipinos  trusted  and  loved  him.  Demands 
were  made  upon  him  from  every  quarter,  and  to 
all  he  responded  cheerfully,  generously.  He  at- 
tended the  stricken  in  the  cholera  hospitals,  he 
rounded  up  the  Catholic  soldiers  in  the  neighbouring 
pueblos,  he  preached  to  his  Americans,  soldiers  and 


INTRODUCTION 

civilians,  instructed  converts,  looked  after  the  sick 
and  dying :  and  all  this  in  addition  to  an  abundance 
of  hard  work  in  the  Observatory. 

He  became  in  time  quite  a  famous  man  in  Manila, 
even  throughout  the  Islands.  There  was  nothing  at 
all  spectacular  in  his  methods  or  his  achievements. 
The  charm  of  the  man  was  in  his  unselfish,  devoted, 
priestly  character.  He  spent  himself  for  others. 
He  won  men  by  that  which  has  ever  won  them,  the 
priestly  spirit  of  self-sacrifice.  What  he  did  was 
only  the  common  duty  that  falls  to  the  priest  of 
God  all  the  world  over :  his  supreme  distinction  was 
that  he  did  it  most  uncommonly  well. 

That  this  spirit  ruled  his  whole  life,  this  memoir 
of  Father  Stanton  shows.  I  am  glad  to  be  able  to 
introduce  it  to  its  readers.  Father  Stanton  went 
through  life  swiftly,  "  a  burning  and  a  shining 
light  " ;  and  the  gleam  of  him  in  his  passing  still 
lingers  in  many  hearts.  May  God  give  us  all  to  be 
more  like  him. 

>i*].  ].  Harty. 


WILLIAM  STANTON 

CHAPTER  I 

The  problem  of  every  work  of  biography,  even 
the  most  unpretentious,  is  to  set  the  subject  of  it, 
the  man  himself,  clearly  before  the  reader.  What 
the  man  said  and  did  i's  really  secondary:  the  chief 
thing  is  what  he  was.  Even  if  the  account  of  him 
be,  in  point  of  fact,  largely  a  record  of  dates  and 
events,  it  is  because  only  through  these  externals 
can  we  lay  hold  upon  the  substance  of  him;  it  is 
because  they  interpret  the  man  to  us,  give  him  to 
us  in  his  setting  and  place.  For  the  rest,  it  is  a 
question  of  choice,  guided  by  that  main  purpose  and 
by  the  decent  conventions  of  life,  as  to  what  facts 
and  incidents  shall  be  stressed,  what  touched  upon 
lightly,  what  ignored  completely. 

I  should  like  to  begin  this  short  memoir  after  a 
fashion  dear  to  the  heart  of  Stevenson  —  some- 
thing like  this :  Stanton  went  over  the  side  of  the 
steamer  and  down  the  ladder,  tossed  his  bags  into  the 


2  WILLIAM  STANTON 

open  boat  bobbing  at  the  ladder's  foot,  and  swung 
out,  running  before  the  trade,  for  the  palm- fringed 
coast  half  a  league  to  the  west. 

Thus  we  might  leap  plump  into  the  middle  of 
things,  and  follow  the  man  swiftly  into  that  field  of 
action  where  he  is  most  fully  made  manifest.  But 
alas!  in  this  sort  of  book  the  conventions  must  have 
their  say.  Let  us  walk  measuredly,  lest  we  offend. 
Of  the  south  seas  and  of  tropic  lands,  there  shall  be 
talk  hereafter:  meanwhile,  let  us  prosily  begin  at 
the  beginning.  The  reader,  however,  is  fairly 
warned  that  these  first  chapters,  written  merely  with 
conscience  driving  my  pen,  will  be  rather  extraor- 
dinarily dull. 

William  Jerome  Stanton,  born  of  American  par- 
ents, was  remotely  of  Irish  and  French  descent. 
His  father's  family  hailed  from  Limerick,  Ireland: 
his  mother  belonged  to  the  old  Creole  family  of  the 
Chappes.  His  father  was  Thomas  Stanton,  an 
architect  and  builder,  who  was  born  in  Cincinnati, 
Ohio,  in  1838,  but  came  as  a  boy  to  St.  Louis, 
Missouri.  His  mother  was  Regina  Helen  Brawner, 
of  Florissant,  Missouri.  Miss  Brawner's  parents 
were  dead  when,  in  1865,  she  married  Thomas  Stan- 
ton; hence  the  marriage  took  place  at  the  home  of 
her  aunt,  Mrs.  Spalding,  in  the  little  town  of  Staun- 


CHILDHOOD  3 

ton,  Illinois,  distant  some  forty  miles  from  St. 
Louis.  After  the  marriage  the  Stantons  returned 
to  St.  Louis,  to  take  up  their  residence  there.  But 
five  years  later,  Mrs.  Stanton,  as  the  time  drew  near 
for  the  birth  of  her  first  child,  went  again  to  Staun- 
ton, where  William  was  born,  on  February  28,  1870. 
The  similarity  between  his  family  name  and  the 
name  of  his  birth-place  is,  of  course,  a  mere  acci- 
dental coincidence.  Two  other  children  were  after- 
wards bom  to  the  Stantons :  Mary  Regina,  and  John, 
both  of  whom  survive  their  brother  William. 

There  is  scarcely  need  to  say  that  the  Stantons 
were  Catholics,  of  old  Catholic  families.  William's 
mother,  in  particular,  was  an  exceptionally  earnest 
Catholic,  a  woman  of  deep  piety,  of  great  generosity 
and  sweetness  of  character.  She  was  not  of  robust 
health,  and  much  of  the  care  and  education  of  her 
children  fell  upon  her  husband's  sister,  Mrs.  Joanna 
Siedekum.  William's  education,  at  home  and  at 
school,  was  careful  and  thoroughly  Catholic.  He 
was  sent  to  school  when  he  was  a  little  over  five 
years  old ;  a  preposterously  tender  age  for  the  rigors 
of  school  life,  some  may  think;  but  not  uncommon 
amongst  Catholics  of  a  generation  ago.  Of  that 
first  school  there  is  nothing  to  be  said  here,  beyond 
the  fact  that  it  was  attached  to  the  Jesuit  church  in 


4  WILLIAM  STANTON 

St.  Louis,  that  it  was  conducted  by  Miss  Anna  Mc- 
JCrea,  and  that  the  boy  spent  six  years  in  it. 

He  had  not  been  very  vigorous  in  his  early  baby- 
hood, but  thereafter  grew  into  a  healthy,  robust, 
lively  youngster.  He  showed  even  in  his  years  of 
childhood  something  of  the  combination,  which  so 
struck  us  who  knew  him  in  after  life,  of  great  physi- 
cal and  mental  activity  with  a  remarkable  evenness 
and  natural  poise  of  manner.  He  was  fond  of 
games  and  excelled  in  them,  and  was  decently  obedi- 
ent in  all  matters  except  that  of  swimming.  St. 
Louis  is  built  upon  limestone,  the  great  beds  of  rock 
being  in  many  plac-es  practically  on  the  surface: 
hence  the  city  abounded  in  stone-quarries.  These, 
when  abandoned,  promptly  filled  with  water,  and 
made  excellent,  though  rather  dangerous,  swimming 
pools.  Young  Stanton  early  made  their  acquaint- 
ance, and  the  keenest  memories  of  his  school-mates 
are  of  his  daring  feats  in  the  cold  waters  of  the  old 
quarries. 

In  1 88 1  he  entered  the  Academy  of  St.  Louis 
University,  where  his  father  before  him  had  been  a 
student.  He  was  a  good  student,  one  of  the  leaders 
of  his  class,  but  not  extraordinarily  brilliant. 
About  this  time  he  became  also  an  acolyte  at  the  old 
Saint   Francis  Xavier   Church,   and  continued  to 


CHILDHOOD  5 

serve  Mass  there  during  the  whole  of  his  college 
course.  He  was  a  thoroughly  good  boy:  one  of  his 
friends  from  boyhood  says,  "  as  clean  a  boy  as  ever 
I  knew."  But  he  was  by  no  means  notably  pious. 
He  had  that  deep,  unostentatious  faith,  which  was 
his  heritage  of  Catholic  blood  and  training,  which 
moves  into  and  out  of  the  supernatural  atmosphere 
without  any  fuss  or  posings  or  violence  or  self- 
consciousness,  which  counts  God  in  its  life  as  nat- 
urally as  a  man  takes  the  earth  and  sun  and  air. 
There  was  no  need  to  preface  this  memoir  with  the 
disclaimer  commanded  by  Pope  Urban  VHI,  for  I 
shall  nowhere  in  it  call  Stanton  a  saint.  H  the 
reader  do  so  when  he  finishes,  that  is  his  affair,  not 
mine. 

Whatever  the  custom  be  in  other  lands,  the  hall- 
mark of  acceptance  amongst  American  boys  is  to 
have  been  dubbed  with  a  nick-name.  Stanton, 
whether  at  his  first  school  or  at  college,  but  at  some 
early  time  in  his  boyhood,  was  deemed  worthy  by 
his  fellows  to  be  known  as  "  Buck,"  and  "  Buck  " 
Stanton  he  continued  to  be  to  his  friends  until  he 
died.  The  name  seems  to  smack  of  the  dare-devil, 
perhaps  of  the  swaggerer  and  blusterer.  Well, 
swaggerer  and  blusterer  Stanton  was  not ;  but  of 
the  dare-devil  he  had  plenty  in  him.     Under  a  quiet 


6  WILLIAM  STANTON 

exterior,  adorned  with  the  most  companionable  and 
dependable  smile  I  have  ever  known,  he  had  a  cool 
and  persistent  pluck  that  would  face  anything;  and 
he  had  a  fund  of  animal  spirits  which  led  him  into 
many  a  situation  that  required  some  facing.  His 
pranks  and  escapades  at  college,  though  innocent 
enough,  were  sufficient  in  frequency  and  unexpected- 
ness to  ward  off  effectually  from  his  teachers  and 
prefects  all  danger  of  ennui. 

A  comrade  of  school-days  tells  of  a  typical  inci- 
dent. In  the  early  part  of  March  one  year,  he  and 
Stanton  sallied  forth  for  a  day  in  the  woods  west  of 
the  city.  Their  wanderings  brought  them  to  a  small 
lake,  still  filmed  with  the  frost  of  late  winter.  At 
the  edge  of  the  lake  a  small,  rude  raft  was  fastened. 
Of  course  they  loosed  the  raft,  and  set  out  with  a 
bit  of  board  to  paddle  across  the  little  lake.  Some 
hundred  yards  out  the  unwieldy  craft  upended  and 
pitched  Stanton  into  the  water,  where  he  struck  out, 
swimming  and  pushing  the  raft,  till  they  reached  the 
shore.  The  cold  began  to  stiffen  his  clothes  upon 
him,  so  they  made  a  little  fire  and  dried  their  clothes 
at  it,  whilst  they  went  back  into  the  water  for  a 
"  real  swim."  Stanton  was  "  laid  up  for  repairs  " 
for  two  weeks  after. 

His  grit  was  of  the  dogged  kind  that  can  endure 


CHILDHOOD  7 

as  well  as  venture.  The  same  comrade  recalls  how 
a  bigger  boy,  in  the  bullying  sort  of  play  that  some 
boys  indulge  in,  once  twisted  and  pummelled 
"  Buck's  "  arm  until  he  should  cry  quits.  But  there 
was  no  cry  from  Stanton;  only  the  steady,  un- 
daunted grin  with  which  a  real  boy  masks  the  inner 
stubborn  resolve. 

These  things  are  trifles,  but  they  may  show  some- 
thing of  the  quality  of  the  boy. 

A  boy's  idea  of  honor  does  not  always  square  with 
his  elders'  notions.  Many  a  live,  normal  boy  prac- 
tices at  times  what  grown-ups  may  call  wicked  eva- 
sions, but  which  are  to  him  the  mere  necessary  de- 
fense of  his  liberties  against  an  invading  adult 
world.  Chewing  gum  and  smoking  cigarettes  were 
made  taboo  to  young  Stanton  :  a  most  iniquitous  and 
tyrannical  taboo  as  some  boys  may  believe.  Hence 
he  was  put  to  casting  a  handkerchief,  veil  fashion, 
over  his  head  when  he  sat  at  his  books  at  home,  in 
order  safely  to  masticate  the  delectable  but  forbid- 
den gum.  His  aunt  was  violently  shocked  one  day, 
when  he  was  about  sixteen  years  old,  to  discover 
him,  as  he  went  along  with  a  group  of  college  mates, 
smoking  a  horrid  cigarette.  When  he  got  home, 
she  questioned  him,  and  he  owned  up  frankly  to  the 
felony.     (Lying,  you  see,  is  ruled  out  by  the  boys* 


8  WILLIAM  STANTON 

code. )  And  to  her  upbraiding,  he  answered  with  a 
twinkle,  "  Well,  you  said  never  to  let  you  see  me 
smoking.  And  I  tried  my  best  not  to  let  you  see 
me! " 

Some  folk  would  call  that  sort  of  boy  dishonor- 
able. Yet  the  chap  who  did  this  would  not,  on  an- 
other occasion,  report  a  boy  who  stole  his  theme 
and  cheated  him  of  a  prize  in  school.  That  would 
be  caddish  in  the  boys'  code.  The  other,  according 
to  them,  was  fair  game.  And  who  are  we  pitiful, 
blundering  grown-ups  to  venture  arbitrary  rulings 
in  the  subtile  realm  of  boyhood?  We  have  lost  the 
vision  which  is  theirs,  and  would  rashly  judge  where 
we  cannot  see.  I  am  not  defending  his  disobedi- 
ence. I  am  but  trying  honestly  to  sketch  his  defects 
as  well  as  his  qualities.  Even  a  crude  portrait  is 
not  done  all  in  white.  Yet,  defects  and  all,  any  boy 
who  knew  "  Buck  "  Stanton  well  would  have  sworn 
to  his  absolute  honesty  and  honorableness.  Let  us 
take  their  word  for  it:  they  know. 

And  in  the  boys'  notion  of  honor,  generosity  has 
a  big  part.  There  are  not  merely  certain  things  you 
must  not  do ;  there  are  also  a  host  of  things  you  must 
do ;  and  many  of  these  latter  call  for  a  deal  of  un- 
selfishness and  liberality.  Stanton  could  pass  that 
test  too  amongst  his  fellows:  even,  stranger  still, 


CHILDHOOD  9 

could  pass  it  at  home.  Brother  and  sister  knew  him 
as  one  who  delighted  to  give,  who,  beneath  the  noble 
sternness  and  proper  dignity  of  a  big  brother,  had  a 
finely  masked  interest  in  their  infantile  concerns 
and  a  gruff  large-handedness  with  even  such  treas- 
ures as  lucky  taws  and  iron-wood  tops  and  rockaway 
skates. 

The  boy  was  affectionate  and  had  the  quick  intui- 
tion of  affection ;  but  obviously,  for  a  boy,  that  was 
a  thing  most  especially  to  be  disguised.  What  real 
boy  but  has  a  horror  of  being  thought  *'  soft "  ! 
The  dear  old  Aunt  Joanna,  at  eighty-three,  says, 
"  Willie  is  the  one  who  understands  me.  I  don't 
even  have  to  speak  to  him:  he  knows."  But 
"Willie"  (who  confided  to  the  writer  that  one  of 
the  agonies  of  boyhood  at  home  was  to  be  called 
"Willie";  yet  who  signed  himself  so  inliis  letters 
home  to  the  end)  would  have  been  most  horribly 
embarrassed  to  hear  her  say  so. 

It  would  not  be  quite  correct  to  say  that  he  was 
quick-tempered.  His  general  air  of  cheerful  poise 
and  fun  belies  that.  But  his  temper  was  fierce  when 
aroused.  He  nearly  killed  a  young  scamp  who 
threw  a  broken  bottle  and  put  out  an  eye  of  his  dog. 
Felt.  All  through  his  life,  one  sensed  in  Stanton 
latent  fires  of  wrath;  which,  on  the  rare  occasions 


lo  WILLIAM  STANTON 

when  they  came  to  the  top,  were  decidedly  volcanic. 

It  has  been  said  of  him  that  he  was  handsome. 
Well,  tastes  differ.  I  never  thought  him  so ;  though 
something  of  the  fineness  of  the  man  shone  in  his 
face  and  made  him  wonderfully  winning.  You 
have  his  portrait  in  this  book,  and  can  decide  for 
yourself.  It  matters  little  either  way.  He  cer- 
tainly had  a  native  ease  and  grace,  and  a  perfect 
social  tact,  uncommonly  notable  in  a  boy.  He  was 
a  good  dancer.  He  was  popular  with  girls  of  his 
acquaintance.  But  he  had  a  boy's  exalted  scorn 
and  fine  condescension  toward  such  matters.  You 
would  have  tested  his  temper  disastrously  if  you 
so  much  as  hinted  at  classing  him  with  the  "  sissies." 

Of  course  there  is  a  whole  world  more  that  might 
be  written  of  Stanton's  boyhood.  Let  these  scrappy 
notes  suffice.  We  have  better  things  to  tell  of  him. 
But  if  they  have  given  you  the  notion  that  he  was 
any  singularly  precocious  or  astounding  sort  of  boy, 
they  have  been  misleading.  He  was  indeed  a  very 
fine  and  likable  boy,  but  most  healthily  normal,  with 
a  good,  wholesome  share  of  boy  faults.  He  lived  in 
modest  circumstances,  but  with  a  well-to-do  bachelor 
uncle,  John  Stanton,  handily  in  the  offing,  to  pinch 
his  ear  and  line  his  palm  with  most  satisfactory  fre- 
quency.    He  battered  his  homely  way  amongst  his 


CHILDHOOD  II 

fellows,  esteemed  with  their  rough  esteem,  tested 
and  trained  in  the  crude  but  efficient  school  of  boy 
comradeship,  unspoiled,  unaffected,  and  —  as  they 
would  sum  it  up  — "  a  mighty  decent  fellow." 


CHAPTER  II 

We  come  now  to  speak  of  Stanton's  vocation  to 
the  Society  of  Jesus  and  of  the  beginnings  of  his 
life  in  that  Society.  His  vocation  is  of  a  sort  that 
is  really  astonishing,  though  by  no  means  uncom- 
mon. The  boy  simply  thought  all  along,  from  an 
early  day  which  even  he  himself  could  not  mark, 
that  he  was  to  be  a  Jesuit.  If  you  had  put  him  to  it, 
with  his  back  to  the  wall,  he  would  have  admitted 
it  at  any  time  from  his  thirteenth  or  fourteenth  year. 
But  he  never  said  much  about  it.  It  was  one  of 
those  fixed  things,  to  be  tucked  away  in  a  corner  of 
the  soul,  sacred  from  prying  eyes,  not  even  to  be 
much  discussed  or  reflected  on  by  its  owner:  but 
which  you  knew  always  was  there,  almost  as  a  part 
of  yourself. 

That  sort  of  vocation  is,  I  say,  astonishing. 
God's  finger  is  most  appreciably  in  it.  It  is  an  in- 
terior grace  so  strong  and  clear  as  to  leave  no  room 
for  doubts  in  the  mind  of  him  who  has  it.  It 
seems  due  to  no  external  circumstance,  to  owe  little 
or  nothing  directly  to  suggestion  or  even  to  training. 


THE  YOUNG  JESUIT  13 

It  comes  into  the  soul,  one  knows  not  just  when, 
like  a  gentle  breath  of  air,  without  violence,  without 
noise,  without  apparent  effort :  and  once  in,  it  enters 
almost  into  the  very  substance  of  a  man,  and  will 
urge  him  even  when  he  kicks  against  the  goad.  Yet 
because  of  its  nature  we  can  say  little  of  it  beyond 
a  brief  chronicling  of  the  fact,  and  the  remark  that, 
with  all  its  awesome  strangeness,  it  is  wonderfully 
common  as  a  type  of  vocation.  Those  who  have  ex- 
perienced its  like  will  recognize  it  even  in  these  halt- 
ing words :  those  who  have  not,  might  find  it  incom- 
prehensible after  a  folio  volume  upon  it. 

Though  there  was  little  talk  at  home  of  Stanton's 
vocation,  it  was  an  accepted  fact,  and  to  the  quiet, 
sweet-tempered  mother  a  cause  of  private  joy.  Her 
health,  for  years  frail,  was  failing  more  and  more 
swiftly  in  the  latter  years  of  William's  course  at  the 
University.  But  with  the  secret  sacrifice  which 
mothers  know  how  to  make,  she  concealed  the  fact 
as  much  as  possible.  She  dreaded  lest  it  might  in 
some  way  be  an  obstacle  to  her  boy's  following  of 
God's  call.  And  when,  on  July  16,  1887,  in  his 
eighteenth  year,  he  entered  the  Jesuit  house  of  novi- 
ciate near  Florissant,  Missouri,  she  was  ready  to 
sing  her  Nunc  Dimittis. 

Becoming  a  Jesuit  novice  is  a  most  unromantic 


14  WILLIAM  STANTON 

affair.  A  young  man  makes  application,  in  a  vague 
sort  of  way,  to  some  one  in  authority  at  a  Jesuit 
house,  and  is  directed  to  the  proper  superior,  who 
says,  "  We'll  see."  After  a  time,  he  is  again  di- 
rected to  present  himself  to  three  or  four  grave 
and  reverend  fathers  in  turn,  and  answers  ques- 
tions which  strike  him  at  the  time  as  a  bit  imperti- 
nent. He  is  rather  impatient:  the  matter  has  all 
been  settled  between  God  and  himself;  what  have 
these  reverend  busybodies  to  do  with  it?  After 
another  little  time,  he  is  told  a  day  when  he  should 
go  to  the  house  of  noviciate.  He  fetches  a  sigh, 
perhaps;  packs  his  belongings,  with  a  touch  of  re- 
luctance, perhaps;  and  goes.  That  is  all  there  is 
to  it.  Of  course,  the  applicant  might  be  astonished 
to  know  that  his  request  has  been  very  seriously  and 
prudently  weighed,  and  that  the  whole  proceeding 
was  by  no  means  so  cock-sure  and  simple  as  he  had 
fancied.  At  any  rate,  there  he  is  at  last,  a  novice, 
and  the  life  begins. 

So  much  has  been  written  of  the  Jesuit  novice- 
ship  that  nowadays  all  the  world  is  acquainted  with 
it.  There  is  no  need  for  us  here  to  dwell  minutely 
upon  it.  The  noviceship  has  a  two-fold  purpose :  to 
test  the  genuineness  of  vocation,  and  the  quality  of 
the  novice  to  follow  it :  and  to  introduce  the  novice 


THE  YOUNG  JESUIT  15 

to  the  religious  life  and  begin  to  train  him  in  its  vir- 
tues. In  practice  the  two  purposes  are  secured 
mainly  by  the  common  life  of  the  novices.  There 
are  "  experiments,"  as  every  one  knows,  rather  spe- 
cially designed  as  tests :  working  in  the  kitchen  and 
scullery,  the  month  of  retreat  in  the  Spiritual  Ex- 
ercises of  St.  Ignatius,  teaching  catechism  to  chil- 
dren. But  the  real  test  is  the  life  itself :  a  humdrum, 
quiet,  monotonous  two  years  of  prayer  and  instruc- 
tion, of  obedience  in  little  things,  of  self-adapta- 
tion to  one's  fellows,  of  silence  and  reserve  and 
quiet  self-control,  of  striving  to  enter  into  what  we 
may  call  God's  point  of  view,  of  building  up  in  one's 
self  the  supernatural  structure  of  sacrifice.  There 
are  few,  if  any,  thrills;  plenty  of  grey  days, —  but 
rarely  black  ones.  No  detail  of  the  life  is  really 
hard :  it  is  the  sum  of  it  which  tries  a  man's  moral 
temper. 

During  the  month  of  October,  1887,  Stanton, 
with  the  other  novices,  went  through  the  "  long  re- 
treat," the  full  Spiritual  Exercises  of  St.  Ignatius. 
They  were  to  have,  for  him,  a  tragic  close.  A  few 
days  before  the  end,  he  was  called  home  by  the  criti- 
cal condition  of  his  mother.  He  spent  two  or  three 
hours  with  her,  and  had  to  hurry  back  to  his  re- 
treat.    Indeed,  she  urged  him  to  return.     Her  work 


i6  WILLIAM  STANTON 

was  nearly  over,  she  knew,  but  it  was  no  part  of 
her  desire  in  laying  it  down  that  its  early  complet- 
ing should  interfere  with  her  son's  high  calling. 
He  went  back  to  his  noviceship ;  and  on  the  last  day 
of  the  Exercises,  October  31,  his  mother  died.  He 
was  not  with  her  at  the  end,  but  came  into  the  city 
the  day  following.  She  died  holily,  peacefully,  re- 
joicing in  the  good  gift  that  God  had  given  her 
through  her  boy. 

We  have  no  record  of  Stanton's  thoughts  or 
feelings  at  this  sad  time;  nor,  indeed,  have  we  any 
need  of  such.  He  was  sorely  stricken,  no  doubt, 
with  that  most  sacred  grief  which  it  would  be  bar- 
baric in  us  to  unveil.  The  Florissant  house  of 
noviciate  is  only  a  scant  twenty  miles  from  St. 
Louis,  so  that  his  relatives  could  easily  see  him  from 
time  to  time,  and  particularly  during  the  first  lonely 
days  after  his  mother's  death.  Henceforth  the  good 
Aunt  Joanna  was  to  be  a  mother  to  the  young 
Stantons. 

There  are  a  half-dozen  or  so  letters  to  this  aunt 
during  the  noviceship,  saved  from  utter  inanity 
only  by  the  kindly  and  affectionate  concern  they 
show  for  all  the  little  interests  of  his  family.  That 
is  the  only  gleam  of  intelligence  or  interest  in  them. 
Mentally  a  novice's  life  is  decidedly  bare.     His  little 


THE  YOUNG  JESUIT  17 

round  of  days,  centered  upon  God  and  himself, 
furnishes  the  scantiest  matter  for  external  record 
in  letters.  Besides,  the  noviceship  almost  infallibly 
breeds  aloofness;  the  novice  has  a  great  dread  of 
distractions ;  he  is  in  a  state  of  moral  violence,  with 
all  his  energies  taken  up  in  an  intense  interior  effort. 
If  one  adds  to  that  the  native  reticence  of  northern 
blood  and  the  moral  bash  fulness  of  one  little  more 
than  a  boy  in  years,  one  can  readily  understand 
how  ill-equipped  young  Stanton  was  for  self-ex- 
pression. 

Nor  could  even  his  fellow-novices  tell  much  of 
him  beyond  comparatively  insignificant  external  de- 
tails ;  for  the  novice  is  no  more  communicative  with 
his  fellows,  ordinarily,  than  with  outsiders.  Stan- 
ton went  about  his  work  with  his  usual  easy  poise 
of  manner,  but  with  an  almost  savage  intensity 
within.  Some  little  of  that  latter  leaks  out,  acci- 
dentally, in  the  discovery  of  certain  indiscreet  aus- 
terities which  he  practised:  with  a  good  will  and 
the  rash  earnestness  of  youth,  going  far  beyond 
the  small  measure  of  corporal  penance  permitted 
the  novices  in  general.  A  fellow-novice  tells  of 
Stanton's  wearing  the  sharp-pointed  iron  girdle, 
common  enough  in  use  amongst  religious  communi- 
ties, not  for  an  hour  or  so  in  the  early  morning,  but 


i8  WILLIAM  STANTON 

continuously  for  days.  And  there  are  some  kin- 
dred instances,  which  go  to  show  the  resolute  ear- 
nestness with  which  he  set  about  these  beginnings 
of  his  life  in  the  Society.  But  time  and  common 
sense  gradually  tempered  this  indiscretion  of  zeal, 
yet  without  diminishing  the  generous  spirit  which 
prompted  it.  Men  wise  in  the  spiritual  life  tell  us 
insistently  that  the  stability  of  the  religious  struc- 
ture in  after  life  depends  singularly  upon  the  foun- 
dation of  whole-hearted  devotedness  to  God  laid  in 
the  noviceship.  A  man  who  does  not  make  there 
il  gran  rifiuto,  may  possibly  make  it  later :  but  the 
odds  are  against  his  doing  so.  We  have  no  doubt 
of  Stanton's  prompt  and  complete  self-sacrifice  in 
the  beginning,  both  from  the  little  we  know  of  his 
noviceship  and  from  the  wider  knowledge  of  his 
succeeding  years  in  the  Society. 

A  trifling  detail  may  be  noted  here :  in  his  second 
year  as  a  novice  he  began  to  use  Aloysius  as  a  sec- 
ond name,  having  probably  assumed  it  when,  at  the 
close  of  the  first  year,  he  was  allowed  to  pronounce 
the  "  vows  of  devotion."  ^ 

1  These  are  the  simple  vows  of  the  Society,  perpetual,  but 
admitted  only  as  a  private  act,  by  permission  of  the  provincial. 
They  do  not  formally  constitute  the  one  who  makes  them  a 
religious,  as  they  are  not  accepted  in  that  sense  by  the  So- 
ciety. 


THE  YOUNG  JESUIT  19 

On  July  31,  1889,  he  completed  his  two  years  of 
noviceship,  and  pronounced  his  vows  as  a  scholas- 
tic of  the  Society.  He  remained  two  years  more 
in  the  house,  as  a  "  Junior,"  according  to  the  custom 
in  the  Society,  to  review  and  further  his  knowledge 
of  classical  literature.  In  these  years  of  study  there 
is,  of  course,  a  trifle  more  latitude  in  the  recreations 
allowed  than  in  the  noviceship;  and  in  long  tramps 
about  the  great  valley  lying  in  the  angle  of  the  Mis- 
souri and  Alississippi  rivers  Stanton  had  oppor- 
tunity to  develope  his  interest  in  the  phenomena  of 
natural  history  and  to  exercise  his  exceptionally 
good  powers  of  observation.  He  was  soon  a  sort 
of  local  authority  on  the  birds  and  snakes  and  plants 
of  the  district.  We  may  say  that  here  he  put  the 
foundation  of  the  scientific  habit  which  became  so 
notable  a  part  of  his  after  life. 

He  was  never  a  dry-as-dust  scientist,  a  man 
wrapped  up  in  the  mere  technicalities.  His  own 
superb  vitality  made  life,  in  all  its  forms,  the  chief 
natural  interest  for  him.  If  he  became  expert  in 
the  classification  of  animals  and  insects  of  all  sorts, 
it  was  only  because  of  his  keen  concern  with  the 
individuals  of  each  class.  There  was  never  a  man, 
I  dare  say,  of  his  breadth  and  accuracy  of  scientific 
knowledge,  who  had  about  him  less  of  the  tradi- 


20  WILLIAM  STANTON 

tional  formalism  and  provincialism  of  the  scien- 
tist. His  mind,  with  all  its  balance,  was  swift  and 
imaginative;  he  combined  the  patient  persistence  of 
the  plodder  with  the  wide-eyed  enthusiasm  of  the 
boy.  Then  too,  he  was  a  most  companionable  man, 
a  good  talker,  an  even  better  listener. 

In  these  years,  too,  his  character  began  to  reas- 
sert itself,  after  the  long  negation  of  the  noviceship. 
He  bore  then,  as  all  his  life,  the  definitive  stamp  of 
the  religious :  yet  less  and  less  as  a  mere  t3^pe,  and 
more  as  the  very  pronounced  individual  which  he 
was.  His  quiet  spirit  of  fun  crept  out  to  the  sur- 
face again,  together  with  that  love  of  romance 
which  kept  him  his  heart  of  a  boy  till  the  end. 

All  his  companions  of  the  years  at  Florissant 
bear  testimony  to  his  likeableness.  He  was  then, 
as  always,  very  popular.  But  he  was  in  no  sense 
a  leader  amongst  his  fellows,  he  had  little  or  no 
initiative.  He  had  a  baffling  sort  of  reserve,  not 
from  timidity  or  mere  self -consciousness:  but  in 
part  the  result  of  native  indolence,  in  part  the  prod- 
uct of  a  young  and  raw  asceticism.  True,  anything 
like  devotional  ostentation  was  utterly  foreign  to 
him;  yet  as  a  novice  and  junior  scholastic  it  was 
noted  of  him  that  he  spent  all  his  spare  time  before 
the  Blessed  Sacrament.     Explain  it  how  one  will, 


THE  YOUNG  JESUIT  21 

notable  piety,  even  amongst  religious  persons, 
usually  bars  its  possessor  from  perfect  comradeship 
with  others.  He  was  over-jealous  of  his  own  in- 
terior life  and  suspicious  of  all  that  might  intrude 
upon  it.  "  Secretum  meum  mihi  "  is  an  excellent 
counsel,  yet  not  an  easy  one  to  be  mastered  grace- 
fully by  a  young  man  scarcely  out  of  his  teens. 

He  excelled  in  sports  and  delighted  in  long 
tramps.  But  it  was  matter  of  common  observation 
that  during  these  Florissant  years  he  never  once 
attempted  to  organize  a  party  for  games  or  an  out- 
ing. If  only  some  one  else  made  the  arrangements, 
he  gladly  formed  one  of  the  party,  a  most  welcome 
comrade  and  a  stalwart  performer.  His  strength 
and  endurance  were  exceptional.  A  traditional 
walk  was  to  the  junction  of  the  Missouri  and  Mis- 
sissippi rivers,  distant  some  eighteen  miles  from 
the  house  of  noviciate.  During  one  vacation,  when 
Stanton  and  three  others  made  this  tramp,  they  lost 
their  way  and  walked  some  forty-five  miles  in  all 
before  they  reached  their  goal  and  returned  home. 
For  provision  they  had  with  them  only  a  bottle  of 
wine  and  some  biscuits.  Three  of  the  walkers  were 
out  of  commission  for  days  after,  but  Stanton  ap- 
parently suffered  no  inconvenience  at  all. 

He    was    outwardly    phlegmatic;    the    common 


22  WILLIAM  STANTON 

opinion  said  he  "  had  no  nerves."  In  reality  the 
man  was  most  keenly  sensitive  and  delicately  organ- 
ized. A  crude  practical  ghost- joke,  which  did  not 
affect  its  other  victims  beyond  the  immediate  mo- 
ment, left  Stanton,  to  the  astonishment  of  all, 
broken  and  sleepless  for  nearly  a  week. 

Some  of  his  early  teachers  in  the  Society  thought 
him  lazy  and  prodded  him,  perhaps  more  vigor- 
ously than  kindly.  It  was  characteristic  of  Stanton 
that  none  of  his  comrades  of  the  time  suspected  that 
he  felt  this  very  much;  characteristic  too,  that  the 
prodding  was  for  the  most  part  quite  ineffectual. 
When  Stanton  moved,  the  motive  force  must  come 
from  the  inside;  and  he  had  his  own  views  about 
duty. 

One  particular  instance  is  recalled,  out  of  the  or- 
dinary. Stanton's  turn  came  to  practice  public 
speaking  before  the  other  novices.  He  blundered 
through  a  few  sentences  in  a  listless  fashion,  and 
with  apparent  unconcern;  much  as  a  school-boy 
might  go  through  the  same  horrible  bore.  The 
Father  in  charge  of  the  class  brought  him  up 
roundly,  and  sent  him  to  his  seat  with  a  good  sting- 
ing rebuke.  At  the  next  class  Stanton  was  made  to 
try  again,  and  positively  astonished  his  companions 
by  his  vigor  and  dash  of  thought,  speech,  and  man- 


THE  YOUNG  JESUIT  23 

ner.  He  could  be  waked  up ;  but  his  tendency  was 
to  slip  back  immediately  into  his  old  lackadaisical 
ways.  Later  in  life,  when  he  had  found  himself, 
he  became  a  very  interesting  and  forceful  speaker. 

The  summer  of  1891  found  him  in  St.  Louis,  to 
begin  his  three  years'  course  in  philosophy  and  the 
natural  sciences.  The  metaphysics  of  the  schools 
had  little  attraction  for  Stanton.  He  worked  at 
his  task  conscientiously,  and  passed  all  his  examina- 
tions with  success.  But  beyond  that  he  did  not  go. 
Physics  and  chemistry  were  a  trifle  more  to  his 
taste,  yet  not  even  in  them  did  he  find  his  metier. 
The  man  was  tremendously  alive,  and  it  was  life 
which  drew  him:  in  ever  ascending  scale,  as  his 
career  shows,  from  mere  vivid  curiosity  about 
plants  and  insects  up  to  that  incomprehensible  ful- 
ness of  life  which  is  the  crown  of  God's  work  in 
His  creatures  —  of  which  Christ  said,  "  I  am  come 
that  they  may  have  life,  and  may  have  it  more 
abundantly."  But  as  yet, 'Stanton  had  not  surely 
found  himself;  he  was  still  in  the  vague.  The  three 
years  went  by  in  quiet  routine,  and  he  marched 
with  his  fellows. 

Vacations  were  passed  at  a  villa  four  hundred 
miles  to  the  northeast,  up  in  Wisconsin:  six  or 
seven  weeks  each  summer.     The  villa  was  on  an 


24  WILLIAM  STANTON 

island  in  one  of  a  chain  of  lakes,  with  wooded  hills 
all  about.  It  was  a  delightful  place  for  all,  for 
none  more  than  for  Stanton.  He  was  a  man  of  the 
open,  vigorous,  athletic,  well  set-up,  extraordinarily 
lithe  and  muscular.  His  summers  were  times  of  im- 
mense interest  and  activity,  when  in  field  and  wood 
and  water  he  made  himself  at  home,  observing,  play- 
ing, studying,  all  at  once.  He  began  collecting  — 
all  sorts  of  things:  butterflies,  snakes,  moles,  tur- 
tles, and  "  such  small  deer."  His  skill  in  swim- 
ming became  really  astonishing,  and  remained  a  tra- 
dition of  glory  for  the  men  who  followed  him.  All 
competition,  in  his  time  and  later,  was  tested  by  the 
"  records  "  of  Stanton,  and  was  unanimously  found 
wanting. 

These  were  years  of  quiet  growth,  uneventful, 
even,  serene.  He  did  nothing  to  mark  him  out 
amongst  his  comrades,  yet  even  then  the  man  car- 
ried an  aura  about  him,  of  native  charm  and  (though 
perhaps  no  one  defined  it)  of  both  native  and  super- 
natural nobility.  He  was  one  of  those  men  who 
do  not  need  to  do  anything  to  signalize  themselves : 
what  they  are  is  amply  sufficient.  There  was  no 
lack  of  men  with  him  who  surpassed  him  in  bril- 
liancy, whose  accomplishments  were  more  apt  to 
make  a  stir  in  their  small  world,  and  who  were  ener- 


THE  YOUNG  JESUIT  25 

getic  and  insistent  where  Stanton  was  unobtrusive 
and  self-effacing.  But  it  was  Stanton  who  thrust 
up  above  the  level,  quite  unconscious  of  his  little 
eminence.  And  it  was  this  unconsciousness,  too, 
which  did  much  to  endear  him  to  his  comrades. 

At  twenty-four,  then,  we  have  him,  a  tall,  well 
set-up  man,  reserved  but  not  remote,  quiet,  slow  of 
manner,  drawling  of  speech,  but  with  a  quick  eye  and 
a  vague  impression  about  him  of  latent  activity 
that  seemed  yet  to  lack  the  nameless  something 
which  should  call  it  forth;  brave  in  an  enduring, 
negative  way;  stubborn  and  strong,  but  not  aggres- 
sive; intellectually  mediocre,  except  where  his  in- 
terest was  aroused,  as  it  was  in  the  field  of  natural 
history ;  a  man  to  pass  unnoticed  in  the  crowd,  were 
it  not  that  the  crowd  loved  him  and  somehow 
pointed  him  out. 


CHAPTER  III 

Pascal  says  that  a  man  does  not  come  to  the  age 
of  reason  until  he  is  twenty-one  years  old.  The 
saying  is  not  all  paradox.  In  reality,  twenty-one 
years  are  hardly  enough.  How  many  hard  knocks 
it  takes  to  develop  that  beginning  of  wisdom  which 
alone  can  rightly  be  called  the  age  of  reason!  How 
many  mistakes  one  must  make,  and  learn  to  profit 
by !  Perhaps  twenty-five  or  thirty  might  be  nearer 
the  age  of  reason.  In  this  matter  the  Society  of 
Jesus  prefers  not  to  take  chances.  It  wants  to  turn 
out  a  dependable  type  of  workman  and  it  is  willing 
to  go  slowly,  to  spend  time  on  the  job.  For  the 
Jesuit  the  age  of  reason,  as  a  rule,  dates  only  from 
his  thirty-fifth  year. 

Up  to  that  time  he  is  ordinarily  in  real  tutelage, 
he  is  considered  by  the  Society  as  immature,  as  an 
intellectual  and  moral  minor.  The  Society  believes 
that  he  can  grow  mentally  and  in  character  even 
after  his  arteries  have  begun  to  harden.  His  days 
pass  in  placid  monotony,  in  a  prescribed  routine,  with 
his  planning  done  for  him  by  another,  and  his  en- 
ergies directed  by  another. 

26 


THE  TEACHER  27 

If  you  know  the  outward  history  of  one  of  the 
Jesuit  scholastics,  you  know  the  outward  history  of 
practically  all  of  them.  The  real  events  of  his  life 
are  interior,  of  the  mind  and  heart:  just  as  are  the 
real  events  of  a  child's  life.  He  is  making  astound- 
ing discoveries  in  himself:  viewing,  with  the  thrill 
of  a  first  explorer,  truths  which  he  recognizes,  a 
few  years  later,  amongst  the  commonplaces  of  hu- 
man knowledge.  His  "  peaks  in  Darien "  are 
mostly  gravel-heaps  along  the  beaten  track  of  hu- 
manity. He  is  forever  starting  deer  that  turn  to 
hares,  and  setting  his  soul  exultingly  upon  new 
paths  —  which  he  finds,  to  his  chagrin,  lined  with 
the  comfortable  villas  of  the  dead.  Ordinarily  he 
is  afflicted  by  spiritual  growing  pains,  and  at  times 
is  cast  down  in  spirit  by  what,  for  the  moment,  he 
calls  the  fetters  of  his  tutelage.  He  kicks  against 
the  goad,  as  every  child  does,  and  dreams  large 
achievements  for  his  majority,  and,  it  may  be,  is 
inwardly  supercilious  toward  what  his  forbears  have 
done.  But  his  dreams  grow  cold,  and  their  dimin- 
ished glory  fades  as  his  years  go  on.  He  acquires 
a  new  gesture,  the  shrug  of  his  shoulders:  and  a 
new  habit,  of  looking  before  he  leaps. 

He  is  steadying  himself,  getting  balance,  perspec- 
tive, prudence.     It  is  all  so  sensible,  so  practical. 


28  WILLIAM  STANTON 

But  it  is  not  quite  perfect  —  what  human  process 
is?  Much  is  being  gained,  but  something  is  being 
lost.  Your  Jesuit  is  getting  circumspection,  but  he 
is  losing  fire.  He  is  growing  disillusionized,  but 
he  is  losing  the  pulse  of  romance.  He  may  make 
fewer  mistakes,  but  will  he  be  so  generous  in  spend- 
ing himself?  Ah,  that  is  the  melancholy  part  of 
this  coming  to  the  use  of  reason. 

Now  and  then  one  comes  through  the  ordeal, 
rational  indeed,  yet  not  wholly  spoiled  of  the  spirit 
of  his  boyhood :  keeping  the  vision :  for  whom  the 
glory  has  not  departed.  You  can  mark  the  trail 
of  such  a  man  across  the  world,  for  it  gleams.  Of 
this  sort  was  Stanton,  though  few  might  suspect  it 
at  the  time.  His  dreams  were  of  imperishable  stuff, 
and  the  years  only  ripened  him  for  their  fulfilment. 
He  had  the  patience  to  wait  for  that  fulfilment, 
even  though  he  had  no  notion  of  what  it  might  be. 
He  had  hidden  within  him  the  wholesome  potency  of 
ambition,  but  none  of  the  fever  of  ambition.  He 
was  content  in  a  perfectly  sure  hope  that  what 
work  God  had  for  him  to  do  would  be  put  to  his 
hand  in  good  time.  He  took  up  each  task  that  was 
given  him,  without  questioning,  without  doubt.  He 
had  a  remarkably  constant  and  simple  sense  of  God's 


THE  TEACHER  29 

guiding  providence,  and  an  unblustering,  quiet  con- 
fidence. 

When  his  three  years  of  philosophy  were  com- 
pleted, he  entered  upon  another  stage  in  his  growth, 
in  the  course  of  which  his  more  immediate  voca- 
tion was  to  come  to  him.  In  the  autumn  of  1894, 
he  was  sent  to  St.  Ignatius  College,  Chicago,  to  begin 
the  period  of  teaching  which  ordinarily  intervenes 
between  the  philosophical  and  theological  studies 
of  a  Jesuit  scholastic.  It  was  his  beginning  of  ac- 
tive work  for  others,  humdrum  and  prosaic  enough, 
as  any  one  knows  who  has  borne  the  burden  of  the 
class-room.  He  taught  English  and  mathematics 
in  the  last  year  of  the  high  school. 

Stanton  was  not  a  brilliant  teacher,  nor  was  he 
an  aggressive  personality.  There  was  nothing  spe- 
cial about  him  that  shone,  nothing  you  could  put 
your  finger  on  as  making  him  stand  out  amongst 
the  half-dozen  scholastics  engaged  in  the  same  work 
at  the  college.  He  was  not  thrown  much  with  the 
boys  outside  his  class,  and  he  spent  only  one  year 
in  the  college.  Yet  he  is  one  of  the  best  remem- 
bered of  his  generation.  Every  boy  in  the  college 
during  his  time  seemed  to  know  him,  and  every  one 
who  knew  him  liked  him.     His  dark  complexion 


30  WILLIAM  STANTON 

and  long  eyes  won  him  the  name  of  "  Jap  "  amongst 
the  boys,  a  sobriquet  that  had  in  it  nothing  of  dis- 
respect, but  was  a  token  rather  of  regard,  of  admis- 
sion into  the  freemasonry  of  boyhood.  With  all  his 
quiet  smiling  reserve,  his  easy  and  unassumed  dig- 
nity of  manner,  the  boys  felt  he  was  one  of  them. 
The  man  had  a  charm  about  him  that  was  indefina- 
ble but  compelling.  Perhaps  no  boy  in  the  college 
could  have  given  you  a  reason  for  taking  to  Stan- 
ton. He  came  amongst  them  as  a  stranger.  It  was 
not  his  prowess  as  an  athlete  that  won  him  their 
admiration,  for  they  knew  nothing  of  that;  nor 
was  it  his  immense  store  of  practical  knowledge  con- 
cerning birds  and  beasts,  for  he  had  no  occasion  to 
display  it  before  the  boys.  It  was  nothing  adventi- 
tious, but  the  man  himself,  that  made  him  a  sort  of 
personage  and  got  him  friends  wherever  his  smile 
introduced  him. 

Now  he  was  beginning  to  find  himself,  to  see 
what  he  could  do,  to  discover  real  openings  for  his 
activities,  and  to  measure  up  to  the  actualities  of  his 
dreams.  But  it  was  only  the  beginning,  as  yet. 
He  did  not  dislike  teaching  and  he  did  his  work  as  a 
teacher  passably  well.  He  had  a  great  deal  of  quiet 
influence  over  boys.  He  won  confidence  almost 
without  effort.     He  was  sympathetic  without  being 


THE  TEACHER  31 

demonstrative,  and  unusually  patient,  tolerant,  and 
sane.  He  was  not  a  martinet.  Order  in  his  class 
was  kept  fairly  well,  but  by  no  means  primly.  His 
own  easy,  drawling  way  and  his  persistent  good- 
nature made  it  impossible  for  him  to  be  a  severe 
task-master.  Of  course  the  boys  "  got  ahead  of 
him  "  from  time  to  time.  But  every  teacher  who 
is  not  a  born  fool  expects  that ;  and  Stanton,  I  need 
scarcely  say,  was  not  a  born  fool.  Conducting  a 
class  is  not  a  Theocritan  idyll  —  pace  some  books  on 
pedagogy:  it  is  more  often  than  not  a  contest  of 
wits  between  teacher  and  pupils.  And  a  good 
teacher  must  also  be  a  "  good  sport,"  and  take  his 
misplays  with  a  grin.  Stanton's  misplays  were  not 
many,  and  he  learned  quickly  enough  how  to  re- 
cover from  them.  I  am  not  going  into  details  about 
his  methods.  It  is  barely  possible  that  some  boys 
may  wade  this  far  through  these  pages ;  and  I  can- 
not take  chances  on  showing  a  teacher's  hand  and 
giving  the  game  away.  Enough  to  say  that  his 
methods,  whilst  very  smooth  and  simple,  were  rea- 
sonably successful. 

I  know  that  he  would  have  been  quite  content  to 
spend  all  his  life  in  the  class-room.  He  was  not  one 
of  those  who  fancy  that  any  shortcoming  in  their 
work  is  due  only  to  external  circumstances,  those 


32  WILLIAM  STANTON 

restless  folk  forever  chafing  under  the  present  task 
and  striving  to  convince  themselves  and  others  that 
"  somewhere  else  " —  anywhere  else,  as  a  rule  — 
they  would  meet  with  the  success  that  they  have  not 
now.  Stanton  knew  quite  well  that  a  man  with  the 
one  ambition  of  helping  others  can  find  his  field  of 
activity  wherever  he  finds  human  beings.  It  is 
also  true,  of  course,  that  certain  gifts  and  tempera- 
ments demand  particular  external  adjuncts  and  sur- 
roundings in  order  to  reach  their  full  development 
and  use.  It  cannot  be  denied  that  circumstance  too 
is  a  factor  in  a  man's  efficiency.  But  it  is  only  a  sec- 
ondary factor.  The  essential  things  are  ability  and 
energy,  eagerness  to  do,  devotedness,  and  unselfish- 
ness of  purpose.  No  ordinary  adversity  or  uncon- 
geniality  of  surroundings  can  frustrate  these. 
When,  in  after  years,  Stanton  offered  himself  for 
other  work  than  that  of  teaching,  it  was  by  no 
means  in  the  spirit  of  running  away  from  a  disagree- 
able task:  rather,  we  shall  see,  in  deliberate  choice 
of  work  which  most  men  might  naturally  shun. 
But  he  was  by  no  means  a  "  born  teacher."  He  had 
little  or  no  driving  power,  could  not  energize  his 
boys,  nor  overcome  that  monumental  inertia  of  boy- 
nature  which  is  the  real  burden  and  cross  of  the 
teacher.     He   was   much   more   interested   in   his 


THE  TEACHER  33 

"  bugs,"  and  his  room  was  as  filled  with  beetles  and 
moths  and  snakes  as  ever  it  had  been  in  St.  Louis. 

The  scholastic  year  beginning  in  the  autumn  of 
1895  found  him  in  Detroit,  whither  he  had  been 
sent  as  lecturer  in  physics  and  geology.  The  new 
work  was  what  many  might  consider  of  a  more  in- 
tellectual kind  than  that  of  the  preceding  year. 
But  it  was  no  promotion.  The  Jesuits,  as  a  rule, 
do  not  deal  much  in  that  sort  of  thing.  The  pro- 
vincial simply  needed  a  man  to  teach  some  branches 
of  physical  science  in  Detroit,  and  reached  out  after 
Stanton  for  the  work.  He  taught  one  year  in  De- 
troit, and  had  spent  a  few  months  of  a  second  year 
there,  when,  in  the  middle  of  November,  1896,  he 
was  called  away  by  his  provincial  to  be  sent  to  a  new 
field,  the  lately  opened  college  in  British  Honduras, 
Central  America.  It  was  in  that  colony  that  Stan- 
ton was  to  find  his  real  life-work. 

The  mission  of  the  Society  of  Jesus  in  British 
Honduras  dates  from  1851,  when  two  English  Jes- 
uits from  the  mission  of  Jamaica  came  to  Belize, 
the  capital  and  largest  town  of  British  Honduras. 
They  found  only  a  few  thousand  Catholics  in  the 
entire  colony,  most  of  them  refugees  from  Yucatan 
during  the  Indian  uprising  of  1847-8.  The  col- 
ony, lying  just  below  Yucatan,  on  the  shore  of  the 


34  WILLIAM  STANTON 

Caribbean  Sea,  is  quite  small,  in  area  about  the  same 
as  the  State  of  New  Jersey,  some  eight  thousand 
square  miles.  Its  entire  population  at  that  time 
could  not  have  been  much  more  than  twenty  thou- 
sand. 

The  new  mission  was  reckoned  as  part  of  the 
Vicariate  Apostolic  of  Jamaica,  In  time  it  grew, 
more  Catholics  came  in  from  the  unsettled  neigh- 
boring republics.  In  1888  British  Honduras  was 
made  a  Prefecture  Apostolic,  with  Very  Reverend 
Salvatore  di  Pietro,  a  Sicilian  Jesuit,  as  first  Pre- 
fect ApostoHc,  The  title  indicates  a  simple  priest, 
not  a  bishop,  but  with  the  power  to  administer  con- 
firmation. Five  years  later,  in  1893,  Father  di 
Pietro  was  appointed  Vicar  Apostolic  for  British 
Honduras,  and  consecrated  Titular  Bishop  of  Eurea. 
In  the  same  year  the  English  Province  of  the  So- 
ciety of  Jesus  turned  over  the  mission  to  the  Mis- 
souri Province,  although  a  number  of  the  English 
fathers,  including  the  superior.  Father  Hopkins, 
remained  to  work  in  the  mission. 

In  1887  a  Select  School  had  been  opened  in 
Belize  by  Father  Cassian  Gillett,  S.J.,  and  nine 
years  later,  in  1896,  this  school  became  the  present 
St.  John's  College.  It  was  to  this  college  Stanton 
was  sent,  in  November,  1896,  as  its  first  scholastic 


THE  TEACHER  35 

teacher.  Another  scholastic  joined  him  in  the 
spring  of  the  following  year.  These  two  with  the 
director  of  the  college,  Reverend  W,  Wallace,  S.J., 
formed  the  entire  teaching  staff,  and  had  in  charge 
some  seventy-five  boys.  We  may  close  this  chap- 
ter with  some  extracts  from  a  letter  of  Stanton  to 
a  fellow-scholastic  in  the  States,  giving  his  own  first 
impressions  of  his  new  home. 

He  had  gone  by  rail  from  St.  Louis  to  New  Or- 
leans, and  there  taken  steamer.  Belize  lay  four 
days  to  the  south,  across  the  Gulf  of  Mexico,  into 
the  Caribbean  —  and  then,  as  it  has  been  said,  the 
first  turn  to  the  right.  There  was  the  usual  cosmo- 
politan lot  of  passengers  aboard,  adventurers  for 
health  or  fortune  or  thrills,  contract  laborers,  em- 
bryonic revolutionists,  mahogany  cutters.  After 
four  days  of  heartless  tossing  in  the  little  tramp 
steamer,  the  voyage  came  to  an  end. 

"  About  4  A.  M.,"  he  writes,  "  we  anchored  in 
quiet  water,  outside  the  reefs  at  English  Caye,  twelve 
miles  from  Belize,  Looking  out  of  my  cabin  port- 
hole into  the  darkness  I  saw  a  faint  glimmer  on  the 
horizon  —  the  Belize  harbor  light  —  and  heaved  a 
deep  sigh  of  relief.  My  interior  qualms  had  sub- 
sided. I  shaved,  took  a  light  breakfast  —  my  first 
meal  since  leaving  the  Mississippi  —  and  hastened 


36  WILLIAM  STANTON 

on  deck.  As  day  broke  we  steamed  slowly  through 
the  tortuous  channel  between  the  charming  islands 
which  skirt  the  coast  all  along  the  colony.  These 
islands  are  all  of  coral  formation,  and  are  covered 
with  a  vivid  green  mantle  of  mangrove  and  grace- 
ful coconut  palms.  The  sun  was  just  rising  above 
the  sea  in  a  gorgeous  mass  of  clouds.  ...  It  took 
at  least  an  hour  and  a  half  before  we  finally  arrived 
in  port,  and  during  this  time  the  clouds  had  gath- 
ered into  dense  cumbrous  masses  and  treated  us  to 
a  few  brief  but  very  heavy  showers  of  rain. 

"  On  inquiring  of  my  simple  Belize  fellow  pas- 
senger concerning  the  rainy  and  dry  seasons  in  the 
colony,  I  received  the  rather  unexpected  answer: 
*  Young  man,  I've  been  engaged  in  the  mahogany 
business  up  in  the  bush  near  Orange  Walk  for  well 
nigh  eleven  years,  and,  sir,  I  came  to  the  conclusion 
that  in  Honduras  there  ain't  no  rainy  and  dry  sea- 
sons ;  there's  only  a  rainy  season  and  a  damn  rainy 
season.' 

"  I  began  to  think  I  had  struck  the  d rainy 

season,  for  on  the  day  of  my  arrival  we  had,  by 
actual  count,  five  downpours  whilst  coming  into  port, 
and  sixteen  more  before  I  had  fallen  asleep  that 
night.  And  these  rains  are  none  of  your  St.  Louis 
drizzles,  but  real  pitchfork  pours;  whilst  between 


THE  TEACHER  37 

the  acts  the  sun  seems  hot  enough  to  broil  a  beef- 
steak in  ten  minutes'  time.  The  second  day  it  rained 
only  twelve  times.  I  got  tired  counting  after  that. 
They  tell  me  I  have  just  happened  to  strike  the  tail 
end  of  the  rainy  season, 

"  But  to  return ;  as  soon  as  we  anchored  we  were 
surrounded  by  a  fleet  of  small  sailboats  manned  by 
crews  of  variegated  colors  —  all  colors,  in  fact,  ex- 
cept white.  I  examined  them  from  the  deck  to  see 
if  I  could  find  any  long-tailed  black  coats  amongst 
the  throng;  but  not  finding  any  such  sign  of  the 
brethren,  I  hired  a  passage  in  the  nearest  boat  and 
we  were  off  for  the  shore  a  mile  or  so  away. 

*'  Arriving  at  the  wharf,  the  other  passengers  in 
the  boat  soon  scattered  in  various  directions,  and  I 
found  myself  alone.  I  caught  up  my  bag  and  made 
for  the  nearest  street  of  the  town.  I  had  gone  but 
a  few  steps  when  I  descried  a  big  umbrella  and  a 
long-tailed  black  coat  beneath,  just  turning  a  corner, 
and  a  minute  later  made  out  the  broad,  beaming  face 
of  Father  L beneath  the  umbrella.  Three  min- 
utes later  we  arrived  at  the  residence;  and  here  I 
am. 

"  Now  what  about  Belize  itself,  the  people,  the 
college,  the  boys,  my  impressions,  etc.  ? 

"  First  of  all,  everything  in  Belize  is  in  every 


38  WILLIAM  STANTON 

way  new  and  quite  different  from  what  we  are  accus- 
tomed to  in  our  northern  climes.  The  town,  viewed 
from  the  harbor  with  the  morning  sun  shining 
against  it,  is  really  charming.  It  seems  to  rise 
from  the  sea  as  by  enchantment,  with  its  rows  of 
clean  white  houses  gleaming  amongst  the  coconut 
palms  and  mango  trees  in  which  they  lie  half  buried. 
They  stretch  a  mile  and  a  half  or  two  miles  along 
the  shore,  terminated  by  the  Governor's  house  at  the 
south  end  and  the  barracks  at  the  north,  with  the 
Belize  River  half  way  between.  The  spires  of  sev- 
eral churches  stand  boldly  up  against  the  green 
foliage  of  the  virgin  forest  beyond,  whilst  the  neat 
brick  convent  of  the  Sisters  of  Mercy  on  a  point  of 
land  thrust  out  into  the  sea  rises  high  above  its 
neighbours  out  of  a  mass  of  coconut  palms:  from 
the  harbor  it  is  the  most  conspicuous  building  in 
sight. 

"  There  are  probably  not  more  than  a  dozen  brick 
houses  in  the  whole  city,  beyond  the  convent,  our 
own  church,  and  three  Protestant  churches.  The 
dwellings  and  shops  are  all  of  wood,  many  of  them 
built  on  stilts  to  avoid  the  dampness,  for  the  whole 
town  and  surrounding  country  is  very  low  and 
swampy,  Belize,  in  fact,  was  built  originally  in  a 
swamp  occupying  both  sides  of  the  mouth  of  the 


THE  TEACHER  39 

Belize  River,  the  advantage  of  the  position  being 
the  deep  harbor  outside  the  bar,  which  faciHtates  the 
shipping  of  logwood  and  mahogany,  the  chief  prod- 
ucts of  the  country.  The  ground  is  all  made  ground, 
composed  in  great  part  of  old  ballast,  mahogany 
chips,  coconut  husks,  tin  cans,  old  stoves,  broken 
bottles,  and  such  like  valuable  material. 

"  Our  streets  —  there  are  no  sidewalks  —  are  not, 
of  course,  asphalted  boulevards,  but  made  of  broken 
coral  and  clean  white  sea  sand,  This  makes  fine 
walks  in  fair  weather,  though  during  the  rainy  sea- 
son and  at  high  tides  some  parts  are  several  inches 
below  sea  level.  We  have  no  screeching  trolley 
cars  or  dazzling  electric  lights;  but  it  may  astonish 
you  to  learn  that  bicycles  are  quite  common.  The 
graceful  coconut,  the  flamboyant  tamarind,  the 
lime,  almond,  banana,  orange,  and  bread  fruit  trees 
are  seen  on  all  sides.  The  coconut  and  mango  are 
to  be  found  in  nearly  every  back  yard. 

"  During  the  first  week  the  thermometer  never 
showed  lower  than  84°  F.  in  our  study  hall,  though 
I  looked  at  it  every  night  before  going  to  the  dormi- 
tory at  8 130  p.  M.  They  tell  me  this  is  the  coolest 
season  of  the  year.  I  hope  I'll  enjoy  the  summer 
when  it  comes.  At  present  I  am  covered  with 
prickly  heat,  but  I  suppose  it  will  have  worn  itself 


40  WILLIAM  STANTON 

out  before  the  warm  season.  The  day  before  yes- 
terday, however,  a  cold  wave  struck  the  colony,  and 
the  boys  were  shivering  and  wrapping  themselves  in 
blankets  and  hiding  their  ears  in  the  turned  up  col- 
lars of  their  heaviest  coats.  It  made  me  laugh. 
The  thermometer  actually  dropped  to  69°  F.  The 
extreme  low  temperature  of  Belize  during  the  last 
eleven  years  has  been  65°.  So  the  last  few  days 
must  seem  to  the  natives  extraordinarily  cold. 

"  The  inhabitants  of  Belize  form  a  really  remark- 
able conglomeration.  Since  my  arrival  I  have  met 
probably  a  dozen  or  fifteen  really  white  men,  in- 
cluding our  own  Fathers  and  His  Excellency  the 
Governor,  Sir  Alfred  Moloney.  Moreover,  you  can 
form  no  idea  whatever  of  the  race  or  color  of  a  man 
from  his  written  name.  Wonderful  surprises  await 
you  when  you  meet  the  individuals  bearing  such 
names  as  O'Neil,  Kelly,  Bennett,  Marchand,  Dunn, 
LaCroix,  and  the  like.  Instead  of  an  honest  Hi- 
bernian face  and  a  charming  brogue,  you  will  find 
in  all  probability  a  dusky  son  of  Afric's  sultry  clime 
and  listen  to  a  strange  West  Indian  Creole  dialect. 

"  The  population  of  Belize  is  given  as  seven  thou- 
sand ;  whites  282 ;  that  is,  European  whites,  for  the 
Spanish  American  element  is  not  reckoned  in  this 


THE  TEACHER  41 

estimate.  The  rest  of  the  population  comprises 
blacks,  Caribs,  Yucatecans,  Moika  and  Mongo  In- 
dians, Chinese,  East  Indian  coolies;  but  above  all 
and  especially  Creoles  —  which  word  has  here  an 
entirely  different  meaning  from  what  it  has  in  the 
States.  A  Belize  Creole  is  a  mixture  of  any  degree 
of  black  and  white  born  in  the  colony.  The  city  is 
essentially  Creole,  though  the  colony  is  not.  It  is  a 
rather  ticklish  business  to  enquire  about  the  ances- 
try, or  even  the  immediate  parents,  of  Belize  people. 
The  blood  relationships  existing  are  generally  quite 
astonishing  to  new  comers  from  colder  climes. 

"  As  regards  the  college  itself  and  the  boys,  I 
must  say  that  I  was  most  agreeably  surprised  to  find 
how  much  had  been  done  in  the  brief  space  of  a 
few  months  by  the  energetic  labors  of  Father  Wal- 
lace in  building  up  the  college  as  it  is.  Everything 
about  the  college  and  surroundings  is  very  neat  and 
clean.  The  building  is  a  new,  plain,  two-storey 
frame  structure,  with  many  doors  and  windows  on 
all  sides.  On  the  ground  floor  are  two  large  class 
rooms,  music  room,  boys'  refectory,  store  rooms, 
and  the  office  of  the  prefect  of  studies.  Above  are 
another  class  room,  library,  study  hall,  and  two 
small  private  rooms.     One  of  these  last  is  occupied 


42  WILLIAM  STANTON 

by  Father  Wallace ;  the  other  is  mine  —  or  rather,  I 
keep  my  trunk  there,  but  I  live  with  the  boarders  in 
the  dormitory,  play  ground,  and  class  room.  The 
rest  of  the  community  live  in  the  adjoining  resi- 
dence. Throughout  the  house  and  college  nearly  all 
the  rooms  are  separated  from  each  other  merely  by 
high  wooden  partitions  rising  some  eight  feet  from 
the  floor.  This  is  to  allow  of  perfect  ventilation 
and  the  admittance  of  all  the  sea  breeze  possible. 

"  We  have  at  present  sixteen  boarders  and  about 
sixty  day  scholars,  distributed  among  two  prepara- 
tory classes  and  the  First  Form.  Remember,  the 
college  has  not  yet  completed  one  year  of  its  exist- 
ence. 

"  Just  imagine  me  as  I  am  at  this  moment,  7 130 
A.  M.,  seated  in  our  neat,  airy,  little  study  hall, 
doors  and  windows  wide  open,  the  slanting  beams 
of  the  morning  sun,  reflected  from  the  verandah 
outside,  bathing  the  whole  room  in  a  mellow  amber 
light  and  bringing  out  vividly  the  variegated  faces 
of  my  youthful  charges.  The  thermometer  at  my 
side  marks  just  86°,  whilst  a  balmy  sea  breeze  plays 
delightfully  through  the  room.  The  huge  fronds 
of  a  coconut  palm  just  outside  the  window  rattle 
cheerfully  against  the  eave.  But  just  look  at  the 
faces  before  me:  five  pure  whites,  two  chalk-eyed 


THE  TEACHER  43 

grinning  negroes  (Creoles),  an  untamable  wee  bit 
of  a  Maya  Indian  endeavouring  vainly  to  sit  still 
on  a  civilized  chair,  two  half  Spaniards  and  Indians 
from  the  north,  a  couple  of  Guatemaltecan  Span- 
iards almost  as  black  as  negroes  but  of  refined  Cau- 
casian features,  and  the  rest  curious  mixtures  of 
white,  black,  Indian,  and  I  know  not  what  —  such 
are  my  little  boarders.  ...  As  you  may  well  im- 
agine, my  boys  are  somewhat  different  in  character 
too  from  the  American  small  boy.  I  am  beginning 
to  know  them  now,  as  I  am  with  them  all  day  and 
all  night,  weekdays,  Sundays,  Emberdays,  and  every 
other  kind  of  days, 

"  You  will  want  to  know  how  I  like  the  place. 
On  this  point  I  can  say  with  all  earnestness  that  I 
have  never  felt  better,  happier,  more  contented  in 
my  life.  Though  this  contentment,  I  assure  you, 
does  not  come  from  the  perfect  satisfaction  of  all 
natural  inclinations.  .  .  .  But  aside  from  the  spir- 
itual aspect  of  the  case,  a  fellow  could  really  get 
heaps  of  fun  out  of  innumerable  things  here,  if  only 
he  had  some  one  to  laugh  with  him.  I  am  sure  I 
could  name  a  dozen  of  the  scholastic  brethren  who 
would  enjoy  Belize  immensely.  But  for  their  own 
sakes  and  the  sakes  of  others,  let  no  chronic  grum- 
blers turn  their  eyes  toward  Belize.  ...  It  strikes 


44  WILLIAM  STAKTDN 

me  that  men  with  a  large  stock  of  patience,  and 
who  moreover  have  an  eye  for  the  ridiculous  and  a 
reasonable  store  of  good  humor,  would  do  very 
well." 


CHAPTER  IV 

The  letter  from  which  we  have  just  quoted  is 
particularly  significant  in  that  it  is  the  first  of  Stan- 
ton's letters  with  the  note  of  enthusiasm.  It  is  not 
ebullient;  but  the  drawl  is  gone.  He  was  waking 
up.  And  it  was  a  strange  thing  that  woke  him  up 
(and  quite  characteristic  that  there  is  scarcely  a 
hint  of  this  strange  thing  in  his  letter) ;  he  was 
roused  by  a  striking  chance  for  self-sacrifice.  It 
is  not  telling  secrets  to  say  that,  especially  in  those 
early  days,  the  possibility  of  being  sent  to  Belize 
was,  for  most  of  the  scholastics  of  his  province,  a 
very  disagreeable  possibility:  for  some,  a  positive 
horror.^  Now,  there  is  a  smug  sort  of  man,  with 
an  "  I  thank  Thee,  Lord  .  .  ."  attitude,  who  might 
like  to  march  in  ostentatiously  where  common  mor- 
tals shrink  and  hold  back.  No  need  to  say  there 
was  none  of  that  spirit  in  Stanton.     Cant  and  phar- 

1  Which,  however,  (in  mere  fairness  it  must  be  added),  did 
not  clash  with  the  entire  readiness  of  their  wills  to  accept  that 
destination  once  it  were  commanded  them.  It  is,  needless  to 
remark,  such  combination  of  difficulty  and  generosity  which 
makes  up  heroism. 

4$ 


46  WILLIAM  STANTON 

isaism  were  absolutely  foreign  to  his  nature.  In- 
deed, the  most  certain  thing  about  him  was  that, 
even  when  he  did  unusual  things,  he  was  not  con- 
scious of  their  unusualness. 

He  was  told  to  go  to  Belize,  and  he  went:  most 
serenely,  good-humouredly :  not  at  all  heroically,  as 
one  going  into  exile.  But  underneath  his  matter- 
of-fact  appearance  there  was  a  little  honest,  boyish 
thrill.  There  was  a  touch  of  adventure,  of  ro- 
mance, about  the  order,  that  made  it  naturally  ap- 
peal to  him.  There  was  a  possibility  of  discom- 
fort, and  a  call  for  endurance;  and  he  welcomed 
them.  These  two  elements  go  a  long  way  toward 
giving  you  the  real  Stanton, 

His  work  in  Belize  was  essentially  the  same  as 
that  of  a  teaching  scholastic  in  any  of  the  colleges 
of  the  Society;  only  the  conditions  under  which  he 
worked  were  different.  He  taught  a  class  about 
equivalent  to  the  first  year  of  high  school  in  the 
States.  His  boys  were  of  all  sorts,  as  may  be  seen 
from  his  letter,  but  by  no  means  unintelligent.  I 
believe  he  taught  them  better  than  he  had  taught 
his  former  pupils;  and  he  certainly  made  them  his 
friends.  But  withal,  teaching  was  not  his  forte  nor 
ever  to  become  so.  He  did  not  shirk  his  task,  but 
the  task  was  not  of  the  sort  to  stir  his  enthusiasm. 


BELIZE  47 

It  is  significant  that  when  he  had  to  get  up  the  first 
printed  prospectus  and  catalogue  of  the  college,  he 
did  most  of  its  composition  with  a  scissors. 

During  his  three  years  in  Belize  he  had  charge 
of  the  school  discipline,  kept  order  in  the  play- 
ground, presided  at  games,  took  the  boys  on  walks, 
and  the  like.  He  organized  the  first  gymkhana, 
or  field-day  of  sports,  in  the  college,  and  made  it  an 
annual  affair.  The  prizes  for  it  have  ever  since 
been  contributed  by  the  merchants  of  the  city.  As 
part  of  that  surpassing  loyalty  to  all  things  British 
which  distinguishes  the  colonial  from  the  home  mem- 
ber of  the  Empire,  Belize  goes  in  heart  and  soul 
for  cricket.  Stanton  made  certain  foolish  efforts 
to  oust  cricket  for  base-ball,  but  of  course  without 
success.  It  is  easier  to  change  the  Government  of 
a  people  than  their  games;  perhaps  the  former 
change  is  the  less  important. 

Bathing  in  the  shark-infested  Caribbean  is  not 
quite  so  simple  a  matter  as  in  other  waters.  Along 
the  Caribbean  one  does  not  plunge  in  cheerfully 
anywhere :  at  least,  not  if  one  is  prudent.  The 
ordinary  method  of  bathing  demands  an  enclosure 
of  stout  timbers  driven  securely  into  the  sand  along 
the  beach,  to  keep  out  sharks,  saw-fish,  sting-rays, 
sea-nettles,  and  such  unwelcome  visitors.     An  en- 


48  WILLIAM  STANTON 

closure  of  this  sort,  usually  rather  small  (say,  some 
fifteen  or  twenty  feet  by  thirty  or  forty  feet),  is 
locally  known  as  a  "  kraal."  There  was  a  public 
kraal  just  north  of  the  city,  considerably  larger 
than  the  ordinary,  in  which  the  boys  bathed.  To 
this  day,  long  after  the  old  kraal  has  been  broken 
up  by  the  sea,  Stanton's  "  old  boys  "  talk  with  ad- 
miration of  his  swimming  and  diving  there.  Back 
of  the  beach  was  a  superb  stretch  of  level  sward, 
the  city  common,  the  scene  of  cricket  matches,  foot- 
ball, polo,  horse-racing,  the  play-ground  of  rich  and 
poor,  black  and  white,  the  most  democratic  spot  in 
a  most  democratic  city. 

All  this  part  of  his  work  was,  of  course,  much 
more  interesting  than  his  actual  teaching.  He  never 
quite  ceased  to  be  a  boy  himself,  so  he  had  no  diffi- 
culty in  identifying  himself  with  his  boys'  concerns. 
He  had  had  some  training  in  military  drill  and  the 
manual  of  arms,  and  he  was  able,  as  a  result, 
to  help  his  boys  make  an  excellent  showing  in 
the  local  celebration  of  Queen  Victoria's  Diamond 
Jubilee.^     They  were  admittedly,  and  very  proudly, 

1  Eloquent  of  the  colony's  isolation  is  the  fact  that  it  cele- 
brated the  "  crownation  "  of  Edward  VII  some  two  months 
before  it  actually  took  place.  The  coronation  was  delayed  ow- 
ing to  Edward's  illness ;  but  Belize,  having  no  communication 
with  the  outer  world  save  by  steamer,  was  blissfully  ignorant 
of  the  postponement. 


BELIZE  49 

quite    the    best    element    in    the    Belize    parade. 

When  the  day's  work  and  play  was  done,  Stanton 
shared  the  sleeping  quarters  of  his  dusky  charges. 
Every  day  was  a  busy  day  for  him,  and  his  one 
respite,  his  one  bit  of  time  for  himself,  came  in  the 
dormitory  after  the  boys  had  gone  to  bed,  about 
nine  o'clock.  Then  he  had  a  couple  of  hours  in 
which  to  study,  write  letters,  arrange  his  collec- 
tions in  botany  and  entomology,  before  turning  in 
himself  for  a  rather  well-earned  rest.  It  was  not 
much  time,  and  he  was  a  slow  worker  (it  sometimes 
took  him  the  better  part  of  an  hour  to  write  a  single 
page  in  a  letter)  ;  yet  it  is  astonishing  how  much  he 
accomplished  by  his  persistent  toil,  constantly  add- 
ing to  his  store  of  scientific  knowledge,  and  remem- 
bering excellently  all  that  he  laboriously  learned. 
Some  of  the  smaller  boys  wondered  if  he  slept  at 
all,  for  he  was  always  up  and  at  work  when  they 
fell  asleep  at  night,  and  up  and  about  before  they 
woke  in  the  morning. 

Once  he  roused  them  all  in  rather  a  startling 
way.  He  had  been  cleaning  a  borrowed  Winchester 
rifle :  the  usual  story :  did  not  know  it  was  loaded : 
snapped  the  hammer  by  chance  on  the  heavy  car- 
tridge, and  blew  a  great  hole  in  the  roof.  Yet  he 
was  deft  and  skillful  with  his  fingers  (although  he 


50  WILLIAM  STANTON 

was  left-handed),  and  clever  enough  with  tools  and 
weapons  —  except  when  "  he  got  thinking,"  as  he 
used  to  say;  and  he  was  as  practical-minded  as  an 
Indian,  until  something  so  won  his  attention  as  to 
leave  him  oblivious  of  all  things  else. 

The  great  interest  of  his  Belize  days  was  his  col- 
lecting. He  had  a  wonderfully  keen  eye  for  speci- 
mens. He  might  lose  his  knife  or  his  stick  on  a 
walk,  but  he  most  certainly  would  not  overpass  any- 
thing of  scientific  interest  or  value.  Every  tramp 
with  the  boys  was  a  search  for  "  bugs  "  and  snakes 
and  plants  and  shells,  for  birds,  beasts,  reptiles,  for 
all  that  made  up  the  rich  nature-life  of  the  tropical 
country.  His  craze  infected  the  boys  until  they 
were  all  on  the  lookout  to  get  him  things.  Their 
interest  seemed  never  to  die  down  during  the  three 
years  he  was  in  Belize. 

And  what  collectors  they  were! — "Stanton's 
bush-boys,"  as  he  called  them.  Most  of  them  were 
half-wild  little  Indians  (a  narrow  board-walk  put 
down  in  the  college  yard  positively  thrilled  them : 
they  studied  it  half  hours  at  a  time,  and  for  a  week 
were  chary  of  venturing  on  it),  but  the  tropic  woods 
were  their  home.  They  could  pick  out  macaws  in 
the  topmost  branches  of  trees,  and  point  him  out 
snakes  —  tommy-gofifs,  young  wowlahs,  corals  —  in 


BELIZE  SI 

never  so  dense  a  tangle  of  "  bush."  They  kept  him 
abundantly  supplied  with  beetles,  scorpions,  centi- 
pedes, spiders,  moths,  and  butterflies.  He  taught 
them  what  to  look  for  and  how  to  capture  insects 
and  the  like,  and  they  brought  them  in.  Then  Stan- 
ton painstakingly  read  up  on  his  treasures,  usually 
in  the  dormitory  watch,  identified  them  and  classi- 
fied them  so  far  as  he  could. 

Sometimes  his  collectors  brought  in  strange  trove. 
One  little  Creole  marched  proudly  in  one  day  with 
a  live  snake  in  his  hand,  gripping  it  behind  the  head 
whilst  the  body,  as  long  as  himself,  writhed  and 
squirmed  about  him.  Stanton  at  the  first  glance 
took  it  quietly  from  the  boy  and  smashed  its  head 
with  a  lump  of  coral.  That  kind,  he  told  the  col- 
lector, must  be  brought  in  only  when  dead:  it  was 
one  of  the  most  poisonous  snakes  in  the  colony. 

About  a  year  after  his  coming  he  began  to  send 
duplicate  sets  of  shells,  corals,  sea-urchins,  crus- 
taceans, and  the  like,  to  the  Smithsonian  Institution 
in  Washington.  Many  of  these  were  sent  to  be 
identified,  as  he  was  unable  to  identify  them  him- 
self. On  one  occasion  he  forwarded  quite  a  collec- 
tion of  sea-shells  which  had  been  given  him  by  the 
girls  attending  the  Convent  Academy  in  Belize. 
The  Smithsonian  confessed  itself  puzzled  by  the 


52  WILLIAM  STANTON 

character  of  the  shells,  and  asked  for  more  infor- 
mation as  to  their  natural  habitat  Nothing  quite 
like  them,  it  said,  was  known  along  the  Caribbean. 
Stanton  made  inquiries  and  succeeded  in  finding 
that  their  local  habitat  had  been  a  load  of  ballast 
brought  over  in  a  ship  from  South  Africa! 

He  was  building  up  a  museum  in  the  college,  one 
that  became  in  after  years  a  very  fine  collection  — 
and  later,  as  is  so  often  the  way,  fell  to  pieces 
through  neglect.  In  those  early  days  the  whole 
house  was  cluttered  with  specimens,  some  neatly 
bottled  and  labelled,  some  very  much  alive.  The 
Father  Superior  was  driven  from  his  room  by  ants 
one  night,  and  stumbled,  half  asleep,  to  borrow 
Stanton's  room  for  the  night,  whilst  the  latter  slept 
in  the  dormitory  with  the  boys.  But  he  did  not 
sleep  in  Stanton's  room  that  night.  When  he 
opened  the  door  to  enter  it,  a  dozen  huge  live  crabs, 
in  a  hungry  mood,  rushed  for  him  across  the  floor. 
He  said  they  sounded  for  the  moment  like  cavalry. 
Another  reverend  Superior,  on  occasion,  left  his 
room  rather  abruptly  when  he  discovered,  on  aris- 
ing, that  there  was  a  small  live  alligator  under  his 
bed.  Stanton  pooh-poohed  his  excitement  — 
"  Why,  the  little  cuss  is  only  about  four  feet  long ! 
He  wouldn't  hurt  any  one."    The  community  liked 


BELIZE  53 

Stanton  immensely,  but  some  of  them  were  a  bit 
uncordial  toward  his  pets.  "  Love  me,  love  my 
dog,"  they  might  accept :  but  they  drew  the  line  de- 
cidedly on  live  snakes  and  alligators. 

There  are  no  end  of  stories  about  these  early 
collecting  days:  of  Stanton  in  his  white  topi,  or 
sun-helmet,  laughingly  walking  home  some  eight 
miles  through  the  bush  with  a  live  porcupine  in  a 
sack,  the  "  porky  "  sticking  quills  into  his  legs  all 
the  way;  of  a  twelve-foot  shark  caught  at  the  mar- 
ket wharf,  carted  over  to  the  college,  and  buried  back 
of  a  lumber-shed  at  dead  of  night,  to  have  the  ants 
clean  the  skeleton  for  the  museum;  of  —  but  we 
shan't  have  time  for  them. 

Snakes  were  his  specialty.  Almost  every  walk 
brought  him  home  with  a  few  dead  ones  (he  was 
a  very  sure  shot),  and  now  and  then  he  triumphantly 
carried  a  live  one,  usually  a  wowlah  or  boa-con- 
strictor. He  caught  the  latter  sort  with  a  cleft 
stick,  and  was  often  well  squeezed  in  the  powerful 
coils  before  he  deposited  his  capture  at  the  college. 
One  half -grown  wowlah,  about  seven  or  eight  feet 
long,  gave  him  a  particularly  hard  tussle  and  even 
succeeded  in  biting  him  severely  in  the  hand.  But 
the  wowlahs  are  not  poisonous :  they  kill  their  prey 
by   squeezing.     Stanton   came   soon   to   be   rather 


54  WILLIAM  STANTON 

famous  locally.  When  some  Creole  workmen  in  a 
near-by  place  found  a  great  snake  under  a  log,  they 
came  running  to  the  college  for  the  "  snake  doc- 
tah,"  and  were  as  much  awed  as  delighted  to  see 
Stanton  carry  it  home  alive.  The  Caribs  at  Stann 
Creek  were  all  convinced  that  Stanton's  walking- 
stick  was  his  '*  voodoo  "  for  charming  snakes,  and 
dared  not  so  much  as  to  touch  it.  Some  of  his  live 
wowlahs  he  brought  with  him  to  the  States,  donat- 
ing them  to  various  public  zoological  gardens. 

There  were  two  "  long  vacations  "  in  the  school 
years  at  Belize,  each  of  about  a  month's  duration; 
one  occurring  around  Christmas  time,  the  other  in 
May,  in  the  latter  part  of  the  dry  season.  The 
Christmas  holidays  were  spent  mostly  in  Belize,  and 
part  of  them  taken  up  by  the  annual  retreat  of  eight 
days.  The  other  was  the  real  holiday,  and  it  was 
passed  in  some  of  the  outlying  mission  stations. 
These  vacations  were  times  of  delight  for  Stanton. 
He  rode,  hunted,  swam :  explored  rivers  and  swamps 
and  jungles :  collected  furiously.  And  indeed  there 
was  delight  in  them  for  any  live  man.  It  is  worth, 
even  on  the  most  natural  basis,  months  of  drudgery 
in  the  class-room  for  the  sake  of  just  once  sailing 
tropic  waters  by  night:  in  a  swift,  high-masted,  na- 
tive canoe,  with  no  light  save  that  of  the  stars  above 


BELIZE  55 

and  the  flashing  phosphorescence  tipping  every  wave 
and  streaking  in  long  Hnes  of  silver  from  your 
bows.  One  can  forget  a  good  deal  of  weary  grind 
and  privation  in  the  moment  when  one  rounds  the 
headland  out  of  the  lazy  sea,  and  swinging  in  to- 
ward the  setting  sun,  beholds  suddenly  before  one 
a  great  shining,  silent  lagoon,  palm-fringed,  studded 
with  green  islands,  and  beyond  it  the  swift  abrupt- 
ness of  purple  mountains  against  the  gold  of 
evening. 

Stanton  was  an  ascetic,  severe  in  his  diet,  rather 
scorning  luxuries.  But  the  languorous  South  took 
hold  upon  him,  we  must  fancy,  for  in  his  first  va- 
cation he  took  up  again  the  practice  of  smoking, 
abandoned  at  his  entrance  into  the  Society  some 
ten  years  before.  We  mention  this  trifle,  in  the 
expectation  that  some  may  seriously  consider  it  a 
sort  of  moral  backsliding.  Perhaps  it  was.  Per- 
haps it  was  only  a  more  intelligent  application  of 
old  principles.  Part  of  religious  growth  is  the 
gaining  of  perspective,  the  learning  to  strike  more 
shrewdly  and  not  to  waste  energy  on  details  of  small 
importance.  The  trained  athlete  may  not  still  go 
through  all  the  motions  of  a  beginner;  he  is  begin- 
ning to  accomplish,  instead  of  merely  drilling  and 
exercising.     His  form  may  not  be  so  meticulously 


56  WILLIAM  STANTON 

careful,  but  his  achievements  are  greater.  One 
thing  certain,  of  which  this  detail  is  at  most  an  in- 
stance not  a  proof,  was  that  Stanton  had  in  his 
creed  no  taint  of  Manichaeism. 

It  was  in  this  first  vacation  too  that  Stanton  be- 
gan seriously  to  gather  notes  for  a  book  on  the 
fauna  of  British  Honduras.  The  book  was  fin- 
ished, two  volumes,  some  thirteen  years  later  — 
and  after  his  death  the  manuscript  mysteriously  dis- 
appeared and  is,  apparently,  lost  for  ever.  It  was  a 
clever  book,  and  I  believe  its  loss  a  real  misfortune. 
He  knew  his  subject  remarkably  well,  and  he  wrote 
about  it  simply  and  directly  with  a  wealth  of  inter- 
esting detail  gathered  from  observation.  But  it 
must  be  said  he  did  not  advance  without  slips  in  his 
knowledge  of  the  fauna.  One  such  slip  is  worth 
noting. 

When  he  was  at  Stann  Creek  (a  Carib  village  to 
the  south  of  Belize)  in  the  May  of  1898,  an  old 
Yankee  prospector  dropped  in  at  the  mission  house 
one  day  with  a  report  of  a  good-sized  drove  of 
peccaries  seen  near  a  village  called  All  Pines. 
Stanton  and  the  Superior  of  the  mission,  keen  for 
fresh  meat,  took  their  guns  promptly  and  set  out 
after  them.  The  peccary  is  a  sort  of  wild  pig, 
running  in  droves,  swift,  plucky,  and  equipped  with 


BELIZE  57 

formidable  tusks  and  a  blind,  charging  rage.  The 
two  hunters  picked  up  the  trail,  followed  it  deep 
into  the  bush  to  a  point  where  it  divided.  They 
separated,  to  follow  each  of  the  branching  tracks. 
In  a  few  minutes  Stanton  fired,  and  shouted  ex- 
ultingly,  "I've  got  one!"  His  companion  sighted 
his  quarry  almost  at  the  same  time.  There  was  a 
regular  fusilade  of  shots,  wild  squealings,  great 
excitement.  The  hunters,  in  fine  feather,  dragged 
out  five  carcasses  to  where  they  had  left  their 
horses.  There  was  more  than  they  could  carry,  so 
they  began  cutting  out  the  hams  and  loins.  A  na- 
tive came  by,  and  they  bade  him  help  himself  to 
the  meat;  but  he  only  grinned  and  shook  his  head 
and  passed  on.  That  was  a  bit  strange!  Every 
one  always  shared  in  the  luck  of  a  hunt.  But  they 
were  too  busy  to  think  much.  They  packed  their 
meat  and  rode  back  to  Stann  Creek.  Evening 
brought  a  small  farmer,  sullenly  angry,  with  a  claim 
of  eighteen  dollars  for  four  young  porkers  of  his, 
which  formed  part  of  the  bag  of  five  peccaries.  Of 
course  the  hunters  paid:  even  added  a  few  dollars 
for  secrecy.  But  the  story  was  too  good  to  keep. 
The  local  police  captain  went  up  to  Belize  on  offi- 
cial business,  and  the  fame  of  the  hunters  was  wait- 
ing for  them  when  they  returned. 


58  WILLIAM  STANTON 

But  it  was  probably  during  this  same  vacation 
that  Stanton  discovered  the  plant  which  is  named 
after  him,  "  Asplenium  Stantoni  Copeland " :  a 
beautiful  sub-tropical  fern.  Life  has  its  compen- 
sations, you  see ;  though  it  must  be  admitted  there 
were  a  hundred  to  chaff  him  about  "  peccaries  "  for 
one  who  had  so  much  as  heard  of  "  Asplenium 
Stantoni." 

The  thing  most  of  note  about  these  vacations, 
however,  was  that  they  introduced  him  to  the  real 
life  of  the  missions.  They  were  by  no  means  all 
play.  He  went  about  with  the  missionaries  on  their 
rounds  from  village  to  village;  saw  their  work,  the 
field  before  them,  the  conditions  of  that  work;  even 
helped  in  it  the  little  he  could.  It  was  a  crude  life, 
full  of  discomforts,  full  of  monotonous  toil,  with 
great  opportunities  to  do  good,  but  with  great  ob- 
stacles to  be  overcome.  He  lived  on  their  scanty 
fare,  slept  in  hammocks  or  on  the  ground,  knew  the 
pest  of  insect-life,  tried  conclusions  with  the  dull 
apathy  of  the  Indians.  He  spent  longs  days  in  the 
saddle,  along  "  deer-paths  "  overgrown  with  tangled 
bush,  and  came  by  evenings  into  squat  thatch  vil- 
lages where,  prickling  all  over  with  "  warri  ticks," 
he  sat  down  to  a  meal  of  yams  and  tortillas  of  In- 


BELIZE  59 

dian  corn.  He  learned  to  sleep,  stretched  on  the 
earth,  with  a  stool  tilted  over  his  head  and  some 
of  his  clothes  draped  over  the  stool  to  keep  out  the 
sand-flies.  He  caught  a  glimpse  of  the  loneliness 
of  that  life.  Your  Central  American  Maya  Indian 
is  by  no  means  a  bad  chap,  but  he  is  singularly  silent 
and  uncommunicative;  and  the  missionaries  ordi- 
narily v^^ork  alone. 

The  upshot  of  it  all  was  that  at  last  he  felt  he 
had  come  into  his  own,  that  he  had  found  his  work 
and  his  place  in  life.  He  dedicated  himself  to  the 
mission.  For  ten  years  or  more  in  the  Society  he 
had  really  drifted,  not  as  an  idler,  but  rather  as  a 
boy;  doing  such  work  as  was  set  before  him,  but 
rather  perfunctorily,  without  much  interest,  smil- 
ingly unconcerned.  Now  he  had  a  vital  object,  a 
purpose  that  could  really  enkindle  him.  It  was  the 
old,  old  miracle  of  growth,  from  a  boy  to  a  man. 

His  new  and  real  vocation  brought  no  outward 
change  in  him,  of  course.  He  was  still  the  quiet, 
easy-going  Stanton  to  all  appearance :  not  at  all  a 
man  carried  out  of  himself,  not  a  sudden  fanatic. 
His  character  did  not  change,  it  merely  settled  and 
took  sharper  outline  and  became  definite  where  be- 
fore it  had  been  vague.     He  was  a  new  man  in  one 


6o  WILLIAM  STANTON 

sense,  yet  you  would  read  the  newness,  not  in  an 
hour  or  a  day,  but  only  in  the  steady  conduct  of  his 
life. 

He  set  about  studying  Maya,  the  chief  native 
language,  with  the  Reverend  Pastor  Molina,  SJ., 
himself  a  Mexican  of  part  Maya  blood  and  a  thor- 
ough master  of  the  strange  old  language.  And  he 
told  his  superiors  that  if  they  wanted  a  man  for 
the  mission,  he  was  ready  so  soon  as  he  should 
have  completed  his  theology  and  been  ordained 
priest.  He  was  indeed  to  come  back  to  Honduras, 
but  not  until  more  than  six  years  had  passed :  and 
the  six  years  carried  him  widely  over  the  face  of 
the  earth. 


CHAPTER  V 

By  the  summer  of  1899,  after  his  three  years  in 
Honduras,  Stanton  had  finished  the  usual  five  years 
of  teaching  done  by  Jesuit  scholastics.  Another 
scholastic  was  sent  to  Belize  to  take  his  place,  and 
toward  the  end  of  June,  Stanton  returned  to  the 
States  to  begin  his  course  in  theology.  It  was  va- 
cation time  in  the  States,  and  he  posted  up  to  the 
villa  at  Waupaca  in  the  northern  part  of  Wiscon- 
sin, where  the  other  teaching  scholastics  were  spend- 
ing the  summer.  He  brought  with  him  a  great  clut- 
ter of  "  specimens,"  including  half  a  dozen  live 
wowlahs. 

From  Waupaca  he  wrote,  on  July  24,  to  the  scho- 
lastic who  had  succeeded  to  his  post  in  Belize : 

".  .  .  You  may  imagine  the  bombardment  of  ques- 
tions which  I  had  to  stand  when  I  got  to  the  Villa, 
nor  have  they  ceased  yet.  They  tell  me  I  have  been 
bought  up  by  the  Provincial  to  boom  Belize.  They 
have  been  trying  all  sorts  of  ways  to  get  me  '  off  my 
guard'  (!),  but  they  say  I  am  too  well  primed  and 
confess  they  have  not  been  able  to  get  one  word  out 
of  me  against  Belize.     Many  of  the  brethren  are  still 

61 


62  WILLIAM  STANTON 

incredulous  and  have  the  most  fantastic  notions  of 
St.  John's  College  and  of  the  missions,  etc.,  etc.  First 
impressions  are  hard  to  eradicate.  .  .  .  My  reptilian 
pets  became  quite  famous  during  my  trip.  I  brought 
them  as  far  as  Chicago,  where  the  smallest  one  died, 
and  I  concluded  to  leave  the  rest  of  them  there,  as  I 
feared  the  colder  climate  of  Wisconsin  would  kill  all 
of  them." 

Mid-August  saw  him  back  in  St.  Louis,  ready  for 
the  theological  grind.  He  was  amongst  his  old 
comrades  again,  some  of  whom  he  had  not  seen 
during  the  five  years  of  teaching  which  had  scat- 
tered them  about  the  province.  Five  years  are  a 
long  time  for  young  men,  and  bring  notable  changes. 
They  had  all  grown  up  mentally,  in  varying  meas- 
ures ;  they  had  known  small  responsibilities  and  had 
tested  themselves  in  little  ways.  They  remarked 
the  growth  and  change  in  each  other;  but  in  none 
more  than  in  Stanton. 

"  He  was  a  different  man,"  says  one  of  his  com- 
panions of  the  time.  "  None  of  us  seemed  to  have 
matured  more  in  character  than  he  had.  It  was 
not  an  obvious  change,  though  we  felt  it  in  some 
sort  from  the  first  time  we  met  him  after  his  re- 
turn. Outwardly  he  was  quite  the  same  man,  with 
the  same  easy,  drawling  way.  Yet  we  sensed,  sub- 
tilely  but  strongly,  that  the  old  indolence  was  gone 


LOOKING  FORWARD  63 

for  ever,  that  he  was  more  purposeful,  more  posi- 
tive, more  sure  of  himself.  He  was  never  an  ag- 
gressive talker,  a  man  to  take  the  floor  without  in- 
vitation; nor  did  he  become  such  now.  But  when 
he  spoke  now,  it  was  with  a  new  force,  a  quiet  some- 
thing in  voice  and  manner  that  compelled  interest 
and  attention,  and  that  was  a  source  of  astonish- 
ment to  us  all  until  we  had  become  accustomed  to 
the  new  Stanton." 

He  kept  his  own  counsel,  as  usual.  No  one 
knew,  at  the  time,  of  his  purpose  to  return  to  the 
mission;  though  before  long  many  suspected  it. 
But  he  was  a  stalwart  champion  of  the  mission  in 
all  discussions.  During  the  hour  of  recreation  after 
meals  a  group  of  theologians  gathered  daily  on  one 
of  the  stair-cases,  and  dubbed  itself  "  The  Hon- 
duras Club."  Stanton  was  its  president.  It  was  a 
very  jolly  group,  made  up  of  men  of  keen  wit ;  and 
its  chatter  was  often  uproarious.  Everything  Hon- 
duranean  was  debated,  burlesqued,  attacked  and  de- 
fended. "  Letters  from  the  front "  were  read 
aloud,  plans  were  made  in  wild  grotesque  or  mock 
serious.  It  was  all  great  fun :  for  Stanton  it  masked 
the  serious  interest  of  his  real  life's  purpose. 

His  task  during  these  years  was  to  study  scien- 
tific theology.     There  were  two  theological  courses, 


64  WILLIAM  STANTON 

one  more  elaborate  than  the  other,  and  at  that  time 
requiring  four  years  where  the  other  took  but  three, 
(though  since  then,  by  Papal  decree,  both  courses 
are  of  four  years  duration).  Whether  one  studied 
"  the  long  course  "  or  "  the  short  course  "  in  the- 
ology was  not  left  to  the  choice  of  the  individual; 
it  was  determined  by  his  superiors  on  the  basis  of 
his  scientific  bent  and  talent  as  shown  chiefly  by  his 
success  or  failure  in  the  preceding  philosophical 
studies.  Stanton  was  entered  at  the  beginning  in 
the  long  course,  the  four  years  of  theology  with 
rather  a  severe  program  of  studies. 

Now  a  knowledge  of  theology  is  extremely  im- 
portant for  a  priest,  even  if  he  be  to  work  amongst 
ignorant  peoples  in  a  mission.  Stanton  knew  this, 
and  was  honestly  set  upon  getting  a  good  hold  upon 
the  science.  However,  both  courses  offered  oppor- 
tunity for  that  essential  understanding  of  Catholic 
truth;  the  difference  between  them  being  only  a 
difference  of  refinement  and  subtilety  in  the  discus- 
sion of  mooted  and  abstract  points  of  doctrine. 
For  him,  the  practical  difference  was  that  in  the 
long  course  his  time  would  be  wholly  taken  up  in  the 
niceties  of  a  science  which,  for  all  its  necessity  to 
him,  was  not  his  specialty ;  whereas  in  the  less  elab- 
orate course  he  could,  whilst  getting  a  more  than 


LOOKING  FORWARD  65 

adequate  training  in  theology,  find  leisure  to  carry 
on  other  studies  of  great  value  for  his  work,  espe- 
cially the  study  of  Spanish  and  Maya.  It  did  not 
take  him  long  to  decide  that  he  really  had  no  busi- 
ness in  the  long  course,  and  he  straightway  asked 
his  provincial  superior  (as  it  was  quite  proper  for 
him  to  ask)  that  he  might  be  transferred  to  the 
other  class.  However,  his  superior  refused  his  re- 
quest, giving  him  only  the  comfort  of  a  hint  at  the 
law  which  ordained  that  a  long  course  student  who 
failed  in  the  examination  in  any  year  should  there- 
after continue  his  studies  in  the  short  course.  The 
hint  was  not  lost,  as  events  show.  In  the  meantime 
Stanton  gathered  his  books  around  him  —  not  with- 
out moaning  —  and  solemnly  read  theology. 

But  these  were  dreary  days.  His  text-books  were 
as  ashes  in  his  mouth.  The  drill-like  routine  of 
student  life  fretted  him,  as  it  has  fretted  thousands 
before  and  after  him.  Life  in  a  city,  with  its  aw- 
ful burden  of  clean  collars  and  blacked  shoes  and 
etiquetical  clothing  when  one  -went  abroad,  was  hor- 
rible to  him.  The  smoke  and  dust  and  noise  of  his 
surroundings  drove  him  back  in  fancy  to  the  quiet 
South,  with  its  clean  trade-winds  blowing  across  the 
sea  and  the  sleepy  land.  He  dreamed  like  a  school- 
boy, and  chafed  like  a  school-boy,  and  scowled  at 


66  WILLIAM  STANTON 

his  books.  But  he  could  laugh  at  himself,  as  a 
school-boy  cannot;  and  he  had  a  vision  of  a  hard 
life  after  the  years  of  school  that  was  bright  as  a 
star  and  very  comforting. 

His  letters  of  this  period  are  whimsically,  hu- 
morously plaintive.  He  hates  his  surroundings  and 
grimaces  at  them.  Even  the  relief  of  letters  is  half 
denied  him,  since  by  the  rule  his  letters  to  other 
Jesuits  must  be  in  Latin  —  horrible  thought !  It 
was  only  on  greater  feasts  that  the  theologians  might 
write  letters  in  English.  Here  is  one  to  his  succes- 
sor in  Belize.  It  is  dated  September  17,  1899,  some 
two  weeks  after  classes  had  begun,  and  is  a  hodge- 
podge of  barbaric  Latin,  Spanish,  and  English: 

"  Frater  in  Xto  Carissime:  Jamjam  incepit  ordo 
regularis  in  Sancti  Ludovici  Universitate,  et  igitur  in 
multis  difficultatibus  in  epistolis  longis  scribendis  me 
invenio.  O  me  miserum !  Tamen  conabor  meipsum 
exprimere  quam  optime  possim.  Proinde  te  rogo,  ne 
respicias  errores  meae  latinitatis,  sed  attendas  ad  ea 
quae  volo  dicere. 

"  Muchas  gracias  para  la  ultima  carta  tuya  y  para 
el  photo.  No  me  gustaba  oir  del  cambio  del  D  .  .  . 
a  Corozal,  pero  espero  y  creo  yo  que  antes  mucho 
tiempo  todas  estas  cosas  en  Belize  sean  bien  arre- 
gladas. 

"  Ahora  de  negocios.  Ne  obliviscaris  my  instru- 
ments.   The  crucifix  is  mine.     In  the  same  drawer,  if 


LOOKING  FORWARD  67 

I  mistake  not,  I  left  my  only  decent  razor  et  nescio 
quae  alia.  Potes  rogare  hermano  Miguel  si  non  potest 
inveniri.     Hie  enim  non  apparet  in  meo  trunk. 

"  Vellem  scribere  nunc  de  multis  aliis  rebus,  sed 
necesse  est  esperar  donee  '  licet  scribere  anglice.' 
Sum  ego  quasi  sepultus  intra  quatuor  muros  albos, 
circumdatus  fumo,  pulvere,  calore,  libris  magnis  theo- 
logicis,  viis  electricis,  et  omnibus  generibus  strepituum 
obnoxiorum.  Oh !  for  a  few  whiffs  of  pure  sea  breeze, 
or  even  upriver  swamps !  Timeo  ne  vigor  meus  to- 
taliter  evanescit  ante  conclusionem  meorum  studiorum 
theolog. 

"  Sed  in  manibus  Dei  sumus. 

"  Al  fin,  hermano  mio,  hagame  el  favor  de  tirar  en 
la  caja  algunos  libros  viejos  espanoles,  to  fill  up  space, 
e.g.,  Gramatica  de  la  Leng.  Cast,  (the  Academy's), 
or  any  old  thing  at  all.     I'm  starving  for  Spanish. 

"  Tempus  f  ugit.  Hasta  el  proximo  '  licet  anglice.' 
Adios,  adios. 

Tuus  in  Xto." 

Life  in  St.  Louis  was  only  an  interlude  for  him 
now,  and  decidedly  in  a  minor  key  at  that.  Not 
that  he  was  gloomy  or  morose :  not  at  all.  No  man 
in  the  house  of  studies  was  cheerier  or  a  better  com- 
panion. Nor  was  it  an  assumed  cheeriness,  the 
rather  painful  sort  worn  in  public  on  strict  grounds 
of  virtue.  It  was  part  of  his  temperament  to  be 
cheerful,  the  result  of  native  good-humor  and  good 
sense  as  well  as  of  deliberate  principle;  it  belonged 
to  his  characteristic  mental  poise.     But  it  was  cheer- 


68  WILLIAM  STANTON 

fulness  in  despite  of  his  environment,  not  because  of 
it.  He  had  the  heaUhy  impatience  that  goes  with  a 
definite  purpose  in  life,  he  was  intolerant  because 
he  had  become  energetic.  And  all  this  was  aeons 
away  from  the  dawdling  Stanton  of  his  philosophy 
days.  On  October  15,  1899,  he  writes  again  to  his 
Belize  correspondent,  this  time  in  English: 

"  Many  thanks  for  your  kind  and  interesting  letters 
and  photos.  I  feel  renewed  life  in  me  when  I  receive 
even  the  least  thing  which  has  ever  been  under  the 
bright  skies  of  my  adopted  country.  My  interest  in 
Belize  has  increased  tenfold  since  my  departure,  and 
even  the  slightest  items  about  the  college,  museum,  or 
anything  else  will  be  most  acceptable.  .  .  .  Gee  whiz ! 
how  I  would  enoy  a  pull  up  to  the  Haulover  or  a 
plunge  in  the  sea !     But  here  is  an  eternal  sit." 

In  the  meantime  he  had  an  eye  open  for  any 
"  specimens  "  to  be  found  round  about  St.  Louis. 
His  walks  always  took  him  promptly  out  of  the  city, 
into  the  open  country  where  one  might  come  upon 
beetles,  snakes,  shells,  wild  flowers.  Soon  his  room 
was  littered  with  an  omnium  gatherum  of  such 
things,  which,  as  he  said,  "  were  pleasant  to  look  at, 
and  helped  to  cover  up  the  text-books  on  theology." 
He  even  acquired  a  few  live  snakes,  little  fellows,  to 
be  sure,  and  not  such  interesting  companions  as  his 
Honduranean  wowlahs.     Now  and  then  there  was 


LOOKING  FORWARD  69 

considerable  commotion  along  his  corridor  and  some 
wild,  promiscuous  hurling  of  books,  shoes,  and 
lighter  articles  of  furniture,  when  one  of  Stanton's 
snakes  strolled  out  of  his  room  for  a  promenade. 
Some  of  the  more  nervous  brethren  used  to  speak 
their  minds  freely  to  him  after  stepping  on  a  snake 
in  the  dark  corridor,  but  Stanton  just  grinned  and 
promised  to  lecture  his  pets. 

He  still  kept  on  too  with  his  notes  on  the  "  Fauna 
of  British  Honduras,"  the  material  for  his  ill-fated 
book.     On  January  21,  1900,  he  writes  to  Belize: 

".  .  .  Concerning  my  notes  on  the  reptiles,  I  may 
say  that  I  have  finished  not  only  the  reptiles  (includ- 
ing also  turtles,  crocodiles,  and  Hzards),  but  also  the 
molluscs  and  the  Crustacea.  But  I  must  go  over  them 
again,  as  I  think  there  are  a  few  points  still  to  be  at- 
tended to.  Then  I  must  finish  the  echini,  coelenterates, 
and  perhaps  the  mammals.  I  thought  I  might  have 
things  ready  to  send  by  this  box,  but  I  am  sure  by  the 
next  one  everything  will  be  in  order.  I  have  taken 
up  all  the  species  named  in  our  museum,  together  with 
a  few  explanatory  remarks  concerning  the  different 
families  to  which  they  belong.  Don't  forget,  when- 
ever you  have  any  more  specimens  identified,  to  send 
me  the  names,  so  that  I  may  be  able  to  add  them  to  my 
own  list  for  my  personal  information.  .  .  . 

"  Life  about  the  scholasticate  is  quiet  and  unevent- 
ful ;  the  only  element  of  excitement  being  those  de- 
lightful! !  !  circles  —  especially  when  you  yourself  are 


70  WILLIAM  STANTON 

on,  which  happens  now  about  every  other  week.  We 
have  one  '  walk  of  obligation  ' —  i.e.,  Thursday  morn- 
ings. This  is  about  the  only  time  I  ever  leave  the 
house.  Our  big  cities  have  lost  all  their  attraction 
for  me,  if  ever  they  had  any.  The  brethren  here  know 
me  as  '  Honduras  Bill '  or  '  Honduras  Buck  ' ;  not  very 
euphonious  names,  to  be  sure !  " 

Honduras  is  the  note  of  every  letter.  It  is 
strangely  persistent.  His  mission  seems  to  have 
got  into  the  fibres  of  the  man.  It  dominates  all  his 
thought,  like  a  "  fixed  idea."  Time  does  not  dull 
his  interest  in  it,  nor  can  any  occupation  take  his 
mind  from  it.  Almost  two  years  after  he  had  left 
Belize,  he  writes : 

"  Thanks  for  the  interesting  description  of  your 
trip  to  Northern  River.  Such  letters  come  like  a  gleam 
of  golden  Belize  sunshine,  like  the  bright  waters  that 
roll  lazily  over  the  painted  coral  gardens  and  break 
with  delightful  music  upon  the  sparkling  sands  beside 
our  tropic  sea.  I  forget  for  a  moment  the  cold  leaden 
skies  of  Missouri  and  the  smoke-defiled  air  of  St. 
Louis,  and  live  again  amid  the  winding  streams  with 
deep  green  borders  of  mangrove,  waving  palms,  poke- 
no-boys,  and  flowering  orchids.  .  .  . 

"  When  you  write  again,  please  let  me  know  whether 
the  village  and  church  at  Maskell's  Bank  are  on  the 
northern  or  southern  side  of  the  river,  as  I  am  making 
a  large  map  of  the  mission  with  all  the  churches, 
chapels,  and  stations  marked,  and  I  wish  to  make  it 
as  exact  as  possible." 


LOOKING  FORWARD  71 

Yet  one  must  not  get  the  notion  that  these  years 
in  St.  Louis  are  just  a  time  of  empty  sighing,  of 
dawdling  over  dilettante  work  in  natural  history. 
Scientific,  dogmatic  theology  took  comparatively  lit- 
tle of  his  time,  it  is  true;  and  at  the  end  of  his  first 
year  he  gracefully  failed  in  examination  and  passed 
over,  with  no  regrets,  to  the  peaceful  shades  of  the 
short  course.  But  he  had  not  really  shirked  his 
work  in  theology,  and  though  he  had  no  enthusiasm 
for  it,  he  did  not  let  this  lack  of  enthusiasm  leave 
him  empty-handed  when  he  had  finished  his  study. 
One  branch,  moreover,  moral  theology,  he  studied 
with  decided  interest  and  more  than  passable  suc- 
cess. That,  of  course,  was  quite  indispensable  to 
him  as  a  priest;  and  all  Stanton's  ambitions  were 
priestly,  not  scientific.  If  he  dreamed  of  the  tropi- 
cal mission,  in  his  heart  it  was  of  the  people  in  it, 
of  his  work  for  them;  though  his  lips  might  speak 
only  of  its  fauna  and  flora.  Where  he  chafed  under 
the  work  of  study  was  only  where  the  study  was  of 
little  profit  for  the  very  practical  end  he  had  in 
view.  Another  part  of  his  equipment  as  a  priest  in 
the  mission  was  his  knowledge  of  languages.  At 
that  too  he  worked  very  hard.  He  read  a  great 
deal  of  Spanish,  and  eagerly  used  every  opportunity 
of  speaking  it.     He  continued  the  study  of  Maya, 


y2  WILLIAM  STANTON 

the  Indian  language  most  used  in  Honduras.     On 
March  24,  1901,  he  writes  to  Belize: 

".  .  .  You  need  not  fear  that  I  have  given  up  hope 
of  the  Maya.  I  have  managed  to  gather  together, 
whilst  in  the  Colony  and  since,  from  various  sources, 
a  Maya-English  vocabulary  of  over  3,500  words,  which 
I  have  just  arranged  in  alphabetical  order,  and  which 
may  come  in  handy  in  the  future.  In  vacation  I  in- 
tend to  fix  up  a  little  Maya  grammar  with  English 
text,  for  myself,  seeing  that  nothing  of  the  kind  has 
yet  been  done  by  Fr.  M.  ...  If  only  I  had  a  chance 
to  spend  the  vacation  months  in  the  mission,  e.g.,  with 
M  ...  or  some  one  else  in  the  north  of  the  Colony, 
I  am  sure  something  of  permanent  utility  in  this  mat- 
ter could  be  accomplished  —  but  —  I  am  still  only  a 
young  scholastic,  you  know.  When  I  first  returned 
I  had  hopes  that  I  might  be  given  a  chance  of  acquir- 
ing Spanish  at  least,  but  I  have  given  up  those  hopes 
now,  as  the  fates  seem  to  have  decreed  otherwise. 
I  hope  that  those  who  come  after  me  may  be  more 
fortunate  in  this  respect.  I  am  thoroughly  convinced, 
however,  that  until  young  fathers  are  sent  to  the  mis- 
sion, fully  equipped  with  Spanish  heforehand,  little  can 
be  accomplished,  at  least  outside  the  city  of  Belize.  .  .  . 

"  What  a  dread  there  seems  to  be  of  Belize  up  here 
in  the  province !  The  cry  is  now,  '  The  Philippines ! 
They  ought  to  give  us  the  Philippines ! '  Before  the 
war,  '  we  shouldn't  have  Belize,  bcause  we  have  too 
much  zvork  in  our  own  proinnce  and  cannot  spare  men 
for  that  old  hole.'  But  now  we  ought  to  get  the  Philip- 
pines —  which  would  require  fifty  men  or  more !  ! 
Strange,  isn't  it?  .  .  . 


LOOKING  FORWARD  73 

"  Tell  your  Rev.  Superior  that  I  am  very  thankful 
for  his  kind  offers  concerning  the  Cayo,  and  tell  him 
that,  in  the  rush  for  the  mission  during  the  next  two 
years,  I  hope  I  shall  not  be  cut  out  of  a  job.  When 
Fr.  Algue  passed  through  here  on  his  return  to  the 
Philippines,  he  put  in  a  request  for  me  to  the  Pro- 
vincial, to  have  me  go  to  Manila ;  but  of  course  I 
couldn't  think  of  deserting  Honduras,  my  first  love." 

But  the  question  of  the  Philippines,  so  lightly 
dismissed  in  his  letter,  was  not  one  for  him  to  settle. 
Father  Algue's  request  was  strongly  urged  upon 
Stanton's  superiors  and  was  being  seriously  consid- 
ered, though  at  the  time  nothing  more  was  said  to 
Stanton.  He  himself  seems  to  have  put  the  matter 
quite  out  of  his  mind,  indeed  not  to  have  been  con- 
cerned about  it  at  all.  The  spring  and  early  sum- 
mer passed  with  no  further  reference  to  it.  His 
thoughts  were  as  busy  as  ever  about  his  mission, 
were  following  the  life  and  work  of  the  men  there. 
Spring  in  the  States  is  the  close  of  the  dry  season  in 
Honduras,  the  hottest  time  of  the  year,  when  schools 
are  closed  and  the  teachers  get  away  for  a  holiday. 
They  went  to  the  northern  part  of  the  colony  that 
May,  up  near  the  Mexican  border.  Stanton  is  all 
keenness,  as  eager  as  if  he  were  still  back  in  the 
mission.     In  a  letter  of  May  6,  he  writes : 

"  What  is  the  latest  regarding  the  Mexican  cam- 


74  WILLIAM  STANTON 

paign  against  the  Santa  Cruz?  How  will  the  result 
affect  the  northern  districts  of  the  Colony?  You  will 
probably  have  a  good  chance  to  add  to  the  collections 
during  the  month.  Tigers  are  said  to  be  rather  com- 
mon between  Corozal  and  Consejo.     Hope  you  and 

O'L have  a  chance  to  drop  a  few.    Any  beetles 

or  other  such  insects  which  you  may  come  across  you 
might  throw  into  a  bottle  of  formalin  and  bring  up 
with  you.  Try  to  get  a  good  photo  at  close  range  of  a 
wee-wee  nest,  and  one  of  the  termite  nest  (comejen)." 

Summer  drew  to  its  height  in  St.  Louis.  June 
saw  the  usual  examinations,  the  closing  of  classes, 
the  flitting  for  the  holidays.  The  villas  in  Wiscon- 
sin were  overcrowded.  Thirty  or  forty  of  the 
scholastics  had  to  seek  elsewhere  for  a  place  to  spend 
the  summer.  A  score  of  them,  including  Stanton, 
were  sent  to  the  college  at  St.  Mary's,  Kansas,  some 
four  hundred  miles  west  of  St.  Louis.  The  boys 
of  the  college  had,  of  course,  gone  home;  so  there 
was  plenty  of  room  in  their  dormitories.  The  little 
group  of  theologians  had  gone  through  the  annual 
eight  days  in  the  Spiritual  Exercises  of  St.  Ignatius, 
and  the  time  of  vacation  was  nearing  its  end,  with 
the  return  to  St.  Louis  only  a  few  days  off,  when 
Stanton  received  sudden  word  to  go  to  Manila. 
Here  is  his  letter  to  Belize  telling  the  news : 

"  Don't  faint  at  this  bit  of  news.     Here  is  the  text 


LOOKING  FORWARD  7$ 

of  a  short  letter  I  had  from  Fr,  Provincial  two  days 
ago: 

"  '  Dear  Mr.  Stanton :  The  consultors  and  myself 
have  concluded  to  send  you  to  the  Philippines,  to  Man- 
ila, at  the  request  of  Fr.  Algue  and  the  Provincial  of 
Arragon.  As  you  have  no  course  at  the  University  that 
you  can  follow  in  class  next  year,  you  may  make  your 
third  year  of  theology  in  Manila  and  be  ordained 
there.  You  will  thus  get  a  chance  of  learning  Span- 
ish. They  ask  for  some  one  for  two  or  three  years. 
You  will  thus  be  better  fitted  for  Honduras.  (Under- 
lining my  own.)  Perhaps  you  can  make  your  tertian- 
ship  there  too.  Of  this  I  am  not  so  certain.  About 
your  time  of  departure  I  know  nothing  yet,  but  I  do 
not  think  it  will  be  long  before  you  start.' 

"  Talk  about  your  surprises !  They  are  all  guying 
me  now  about  '  shaking '  Belize  — '  pulling  on  '  poor 
victims  for  Belize,  so  that  I  could  sneak  out  of  the 
blessed  hole  myself.  But  never  fear,  old  boy,  I  shan't 
go  back  on  my  first  love.  I'll  be  ready  for  the  '  bush ' 
when  I  have  finished  my  tertianship,  if  the  Lord  spares 
me  so  long. 

"  What  messages  does  '  el  Padre  viejo '  wish  me  to 
bring  to  his  old  friends  in  the  Philippines?  Tell  him 
I  have  begun  to  brush  up  all  the  Spanish  swear  words 
and  curses  he  taught  me  in  Belize,  so  as  to  be  prop- 
erly equipped  to  instruct  the  youthful  Filipinos.  Now 
I  hear  him  — '  Canastos !  caspita  hombre !  que  tonter- 
ias !  ese  muchacho !  !  ! '  " 

It  is  very  Jesuit,  this  letter.  He  is  astonished; 
his  plans  are  upset;  practically  without  warning  he 


76  WILLIAM  STANTON 

is  packed  off  to  a  foreign  field,  half  a  world  away 
from  where  he  expected  to  be.  Yet  not  only  is 
there  no  expression  of  complaint  or  protest,  but  you 
are  aware  that  there  is  not  even  a  complaint  sup- 
pressed. In  perfect  good-humor,  in  a  most  matter- 
of-fact  way,  he  simply  states  and  accepts  the  facts. 
It  is  a  clean  about-face,  but  he  does  not  even  change 
his  stride.  Oh,  he  is  still  going  back  to  Honduras 
some  day;  Manila  is  only  a  detour,  so  to  speak. 
But  when  one  is  all  set  on  a  goal,  even  a  detour 
might  entitle  one  to  protest.  Apparently,  however, 
the  mere  idea  of  this  has  simply  not  occurred  to 
Stanton.  He  is  not  deserting  Honduras;  his  su- 
periors have  sent  him  away.  So  that's  all  right. 
It's  really  their  funeral:  he  is  only  riding  in  the 
hearse.  He  came  back  to  St.  Louis,  packed  his 
trunk,  gave  away  his  snakes,  and  was  in  San  Fran- 
cisco by  the  end  of  the  month. 


CHAPTER  VI 

Now-a-days,  when  travel  has  become  so  common 
that  a  Httle  jaunt  to  Thibet  hardly  furnishes  matter 
for  a  drawing-room  conversation,  it  may  be  thought 
a  bore  to  set  before  a  reader  Stanton's  letters  on  his 
voyage  to  the  Far  East.  However,  they  are  not 
offered  as  "  travelogues "  or  pretentious  bits  of 
descriptive  writing.  Their  value  for  us  is  an  indi- 
rect portrayal  of  their  writer;  the  man  shows  him- 
self in  his  letters,  unconsciously,  yet  clearly  enough 
to  the  discerning.  To  that  purpose  we  shall  let 
this  chapter  be  a  cluster  of  citations  from  his  letters. 
Besides,  if  any  one  does  not  wish  to  read  them,  he 
may  just  skip  the  whole  chapter. 

Stanton  went  out  to  Manila  as  an  assistant  in  the 
Observatory  conducted  by  the  Jesuits  there  and 
lately  become  a  part  of  the  United  States  Govern- 
ment service;  hence  as  a  Government  employee  he 
was  entitled  to  passage  on  one  of  the  U.  S.  trans- 
ports. He  arrived  in  San  Francisco  just  in  time 
to  miss  a  sailing,  and  had  a  delay  in  consequence  of 
some  two  weeks,  which  he  put  in  visiting  some  of 

17 


78  WILLIAM  STANTON 

the  old  mission  places  of  California.  His  jottings 
take  up  from  the  day  of  departure. 

"  U.  S.  Transport  Warren,  Honolulu,  Hawaiian  Ty., 
Sept.  26,  1901. 

"  Monday  morning,  the  i6th,  after  running  down 
town  to  make  my  last  purchases  of  a  few  books  and 
a  little  burning  material  for  the  voyage,  I  returned  to 
the  college  and  took  leave  of  my  friends  there.  Fr. 
Testa,  who  had  been  very  kind  during  my  stay  in  man- 
aging all  business  connected  with  my  voyage,  accom- 
panied me  to  the  steamer.  We  left  the  wharf  promptly 
at  noon,  and  stood  out  through  the  Golden  Gate  in  a 
raw,  misty,  cold  breeze.  Everything  about  the  bay 
looked  cold  and  gloomy  —  real  San  Francisco 
weather,  so  far  as  I  could  judge  by  my  two  weeks' 
stay. 

"  We  have  about  160  passengers  aboard,  made  up 
of  army  and  navy  officers,  school  teachers,  Protestant 
ministers,  army  chaplains,  army  nurses,  veterinary 
surgeons,  wives  of  officers  and  soldiers,  babies,  etc. 
We  had  scarcely  started  when  I  was  accosted  by  a 
portly,  rather  young,  and  pompous-looking  individ- 
ual in  the  uniform  of  an  army  chaplain,  who  intro- 
duced himself  as  Chaplain  N from  some  town 

in  Texas.  He  asked  me  if  I  were  not  Chaplain 
Steele  of  the  21st  Infantry.  Shortly  after,  I  found, 
to  my  astonishment,  that  my  room-mate  was  none 
other  than  the  aforesaid  Steele,  a  good,  business-like 
fellow.  The  Quartermaster  doubtless  thought  that 
the  preachers  ought  to  get  along  well  together,  and 
so  we  do,  though  it  is  rather  an  amusing  combina- 
tion. .  .  . 


LETTERS  79 

"At  table  I  have  been  assigned  a  place  beside  the 
Captain,  with  the  two  ministers  below  me,  the  first 
mate  at  the  foot,  whilst  three  army  officers  and  one 
lady  occupy  the  remaining  seats.  So  you  see  the 
wild  Carib  from  the  bush  is  being  most  courteously 
treated  aboard  the  Warren. 

"  Third  day  out,  breeze  very  mild,  but  clouds  hid 
the  sun  all  day,  sea  quite  smooth. 

"  Thursday,  19th,  the  sky  was  clear  all  day.  Balmy 
breezes  came  up  from  the  south,  reminding  me  of 
the  sunny  paradise  beside  the  Caribbean,  for  which 
our  friend  '  tin  twinty '  is  so  eagerly  preparing. 
.  .  .  At    10:30  A.M.   we  had  memorial   services   for 

the   President,   in   the  saloon,  with   Chaplain   N 

presiding.  All  the  ladies  and  officers  were  present, 
the  latter  in  full  uniform.  After  the  singing  of  the 
national  anthem,  and  an  improvised  prayer  by  the 
other  chaplain,  the  presiding  one  made  an  introduc- 
tory speech.  Then  Col.  Fechet  was  called  upon,  as 
representing  the  Army.  The  next  number  on  the 
program  was  an  address  by  Fr.  Stanton.  The  last- 
named  gentleman  had  tried  to  get  out  of  the  per- 
formance, but  under  the  circumstances  that  could  not 
be  done  very  gracefully,  so  he  ventured  a  few  re- 
marks on  the  right  understanding  of  the  principle 
of  human  liberty  and  the  Catholic  doctrine  on  the  prin- 
ciple of  authority.  He  thought  it  a  good  chance  to 
recall  a  few  fundamental  truths  to  minds  which  rarely 
dwell  on  such  matters.  Other  speakers  followed.  Fr. 
S.  was  naturally  wondering  what  effect  his  remarks 
had  on  his  audience.  One  of  the  chief  officers  on 
board  came  up  afterwards  and  complimented  him 
on  having  touched  on  a  phase  of  the  question  which 


8o  WILLIAM  STANTON 

had  been  altogether  overlooked  by  the  other  speakers. 
There  was  something  solid  in  that,  he  said.  So.  Fr. 
S.  felt  that  at  least  he  had  not  made  such  a  thunder- 
ing big  fool  of  himself. 

"  Friday,  Sept.  20.  Typical  tropical  morning, 
smooth  sea,  pleasant  breeze,  scattered  clouds,  oc- 
casional light  showers.  New  faces  still  appearing 
from  time  to  time  on  deck;  though  by  now  all  seem 
to  have  got  their  sea-legs  and  people  are  becoming 
well  acquainted  with  each  other.  The  chaplains  got 
up  a  spelling-bee  in  the  evening,  good  fun  for  a  while. 
Later,  adjourned  to  the  after  deck  and  had  some  fair 
singing  from  ladies  and  young  gentlemen.  Some  fine 
voices  aboard.  Strange  to  say,  there  is  no  instrumen- 
tal music  aboard  but  that  of  an  accordion,  which  one 
of  the  sailors  manipulates. 

"  Before  turning  in  for  the  night,  I  watched  the 
phosphorescent  gleamings  of  the  marine  organisms, 
as  the  ship  plowed  through  the  waves,  leaving  a  trail 
of  fire  after  her.  Straight  in  the  path  before  us,  a 
dense  black  cloud  hung  sweeping  down  to  the  horizon ; 
a  crescent  moon  crept  out  above  its  rim,  and  spilled  a 
flood  of  silver  light  upon  the  sea. 

"Sat.  2ist.  Glorious  morning;  sea  calm  and  oily, 
nothing  but  the  long,  heaving  swells  and  the  plowing 
of  the  ship  to  disturb  its  surface.  Flying  fish  like 
darts  of  silver  leap  from  the  sea  and  shoot  through 
the  air,  sometimes  for  a  hundred  yards  distance. 

"  In  the  evening  Chaplain  N brought  the  sailor 

with  the  accordion  for  a  little  music.  Scarcely  had 
the  thing  started,  when  the  feet  of  the  young  people 
began  to  feel  very  light,  and  in  a  moment  half  a 
dozen  couples  were  doing  the  light  fantastic  with  a 


LETTERS  8i 

gusto.  An  improvised  cake  walk  soon  succeeded,  and 
things  became  quite  gay;  every  one  but  the  chaplain 
enjoying  himself  immensely.  The  latter  is  a  strict 
Methodist  and  much  averse  to  dancing,  and  seeing  that 
he  had  been  the  cause  of  the  levity  by  bringing  up  the 
accordion,  he  felt  quite  discomfited.  Turning  to  me,  he 
said  in  his  slow,  southern  drawl,  '  Well,  now,  I  didn't 
foresee  such  a  turn  of  events ! '  He  had  to  stand  a 
good  deal  of  teasing  from  his  friends.  Afterwards  we 
got  one  of  the  coon  waiters  up,  and  you  should  have 
seen  him  pound  that  deck  and  twist  his  legs  into  bow 
knots!  We  clapped  that  nigger  up  till  he  could 
scarcely  stand  any  longer. 

"  Sun.  22nd.  Fine  breeze  —  in  the  trade  winds  — 
more  flying  fish.  Protestants  held  services  at  10:30 
A.  M.  Had  a  great  chat  with  the  first  mate,  Griffiths, 
a  Welshman,  a  regular  weather-beaten  sea-dog,  and  a 
big-hearted  old  fellow.  The  Captain  of  the  vessel 
is  an  Australian  and  most  of  the  sailors  are  Welshmen, 
with  a  good  sprinkling  of  Irishmen. 

"  Tues.  23d.  The  welcome  sight  of  land  to  our  left 
greeted  us  at  six  a.  m.  It  was  the  island  of  Molokai, 
the  scene  of  the  heroic  sacrifice  of  Father  Damien. 
By  noon  the  mountain  peaks  of  Oahu  loomed  up  to 
our  right,  and  the  decks  became  crowded. 

"...  I  have  an  engagement  to  go  out  to  the  Pali  in 
a  few  moments,  so  must  put  off  any  further  scratch- 
ings  till  later. 

U.  S.  Trans.  Warren,  Oct.  8,  1901. 
"  Still  sailing  over  the  deep  —  not  a  sail  or  sign  of 
human  life  outside  of  our  own   ship   since   we   left 
Honolulu  ten  days  ago.     I  think  I  left  you  last  in 


82  WILLIAM  STANTON 

sight  of  Oahu.  Well,  let  me  inflict  some  more  Ha- 
waiian jottings  which  I  hope  to  send  off  by  the  first 
mail  that  leaves  Manila  after  my  arrival. 

"  How  we  did  cheer  up  at  sight  of  those  beautiful 
islands !  About  noon  of  Tuesday,  24th,  we  were  quite 
close  to  the  red  and  purple  volcanic  masses,  against 
the  base  of  which  the  noisy  breakers  dashed  their 
feathery  crests.  The  side  of  the  island  first  approached 
appears  rather  barren  of  vegetation,  but  on  turning 
the  first  point  the  scene  changes.  Straight  ahead  is 
seen  a  bold  promontory,  called  Diamond  Head,  near 
the  base  of  which  is  the  light-house.  Between  the 
first  point  and  Diamond  Head  stretches  a  large  bay, 
with  green  mountainsides  rising  behind,  coconut 
palms  fringing  the  shore,  picturesque  clusters  of  native 
huts  peeping  from  their  green  surroundings.  Here 
and  there  the  volcanic  rocks  reach  right  down  to  the 
sea  and  are  hollowed  out  into  fantastic  caverns  by  the 
surf.  Passing  Diamond  Head,  we  came  in  sight  of  a 
faery  scene,  the  lovely  Waikiki  beach,  the  perpetual 
summer  resort  for  the  residents  of  Honolulu.  Charm- 
ing cottages  embowered  in  tropical  foliage  line  the 
shore.  Behind  them  the  mountains  rose,  an  infinite 
variety  of  green  and  purple  up  to  the  very  peaks. 
These  latter  were  wrapped  in  swaying  and  changing 
masses  of  clouds,  swift-moving,  mysterious,  from 
which  showers  broke  here  and  there.  Bright  villas 
perched  high  up  on  the  hillsides.  Off  to  the  left  a 
few  wreaths  of  smoke  from  tall  chimneys  showed  the 
location  of  Honolulu  itself. 

"  As  we  steamed  into  the  harbour,  the  boat  was  sur- 
rounded by  a  crowd  of  young  Kanakas,  whose  lithe 
velvety  limbs  gleamed  in  the  blue  waters.     They  were 


LETTERS  83 

soon  diving  for  the  coins  which  the  passengers  threw 
overboard.  And  such  diving!  As  soon  as  a  coin 
struck  the  water,  down  went  heads  and  arms,  and  for 
a  moment  nothing  was  seen  but  a  confused  tangle  of 
gHstening  legs  disappearing  gradually  into  the  depths. 
But  before  long  up  came  the  smiling  faces,  and  in 
the  waving  hand  of  one  the  coin  glistened  securely. 
This  went  into  the  mouth  of  the  successful  little  diver, 
and  all  were  ready  for  another  turn. 

"  We  made  the  wharf  at  4 130,  and  found  it  crowded 
with  magnificent  Kanakas,  broad-shouldered  and  pow- 
erful-looking fellows,  but  spoiled  of  their  poetry  by 
their  barbarous  modern  garments.  As  we  had  an  hour 
before  dinner,  I  took  a  stroll  through  the  business  part 
of  town.  Most  of  the  shops  and  the  streets  seemed  to 
be  in  possession  of  the  Chinese  and  Japs,  all  in  their 
native  costume.  Got  back  to  ship  at  6:30  and  had 
dinner.  After  dinner  we  made  a  party  to  go  out  to 
Waikiki  and  take  a  surf  bath  by  moonlight.  About 
thirty  of  us  took  the  horse  cars  near  the  wharf. 
Waikiki  is  about  three  miles  from  Honolulu,  and  the 
ride  along  the  beautiful  road  by  moonlight  was  quite 
delightful.  At  times  the  odor  of  tube-roses  and  other 
flowers  was  overpowering  in  its  sweetness.  We 
stopped  at  the  Hawaiian  Hotel  Annex,  a  large,  neat 
bathing  establishment,  where  towels  and  bathing  suits 
were  secured  for  a  trifle.  In  a  few  moments  I  stepped 
out  on  the  moonlit  sands  and  thanked  God  for  the 
W-aikiki  beach,  the  world-famed.  The  rolling,  rush- 
ing breakers  burst  in  a  mass  of  foam  on  the  silvery 
sands  at  my  feet.  The  next  instant,  the  refreshing 
waters  closed  over  the  more  or  less  supple  limbs  of 
Buck  Stanton.     What  a  lelief  after  being  cramped  up 


84  WILLIAM  STANTON 

in  a  ship  for  over  a  week!  And  what  undignified 
somersaults  some  of  our  party  did  turn,  when  the  swift, 
foaming  breakers  caught  them  where  they  hved  and 
rolled  them  over  on  the  beach,  a  tangle  of  arms,  legs 
and  bathing  suits,  and  then,  before  they  could  scramble 
to  their  feet,  slid  them  back  again  into  the  water,  just 
in  time  to  be  caught  by  the  next  one.  These  rollers 
beat  Stann  Creek  all  hollow ! 

"  Without  knowing  it,  I  made  quite  a  hit  on  this  oc- 
casion. My  companion  to  the  beach  was  a  young  offi- 
cer, a  graduate  of  Pennsylvania,  of  a  strapping  ath- 
letic build.  We  swam  out  beyond  the  crowd,  and  he 
proposed  that  we  stretch  our  limbs  in  a  little  race  to 
the  diving  platform,  some  hundred  and  fifty  yards 
away.  He  swam  well,  but  I  left  him  far  in  the  rear, 
much  to  his  surprise.  He  complimented  me  on  my 
stroke,  and  expressed  his  astonishment  that  the  '  Pa- 
dre '  (my  usual  appellation  on  board)  could  swim  so 
well.  I  gave  no  further  thought  to  the  occurrence, 
but  the  day  following  he  insisted  that  we  should  take 
another  dip  by  daylight.  This  time  a  young  naval  offi- 
cer accompanied  us,  a  man  of  gigantic  frame.  When 
we  came  out  on  the  veranda  overhanging  the  beach,  we 
found  nearly  all  the  passengers  of  the  Warren,  and  a 
good  part  of  the  crew,  scattered  about  in  knots,  as  if 
awaiting  something  of  interest.  I  heard  the  word 
'  Padre '  mentioned  now  and  again,  and  began  to  won- 
der what  was  up.  The  three  of  us  were  soon  in  the 
waves,  and,  as  I  had  begun  to  suspect,  we  were  to  have 
another  race,  but  this  time  some  quarter  of  a  mile. 
I  was  in  for  anything  in  that  line,  though  when  I 
looked  at  the  huge  muscularity  of  the  naval  officer,  I 
knew   I   was   up  against  the   real  thing.     However, 


LETTERS  85 

thought  I,  I'll  have  the  exercise  at  any  rate.  I  saw 
now  the  object  of  the  crowds  on  the  veranda. 

"  Off  we  started,  observed  of  all  observers.  The 
naval  man  shot  out  from  the  line  like  a  cannon  ball, 
but  before  he  had  gone  fifty  yards  I  was  with  him 
neck  and  neck,  and  at  the  goal  found  him  more  than 
fifty  feet  in  the  rear.  When  he  climbed  up  on  the 
platform,  he  caught  -my  hand  and  congratulated  me, 
and  said:  '  Padre,  I've  raced  against  dozens  of  first- 
class  swimmers  in  the  east,  many  of  them  with  big 
reputations,  and  have  never  been  beaten  until  this 
moment.  I'll  be  hanged  if  I  ever  saw  such  a  power- 
ful overhand  stroke  in  my  life.  Let  me  look  at  your 
arm  and  hand.'  He  held  up  his  brawny  arm  along- 
side of  mine.  '  Well,'  said  he,  '  I  can't  understand  it ! 
My  hand  and  arm  would  make  three  of  yours,  and 
yet  I  can't  come  near  that  stroke  of  yours.' 

'*  I  then  learned  that  talk  about  the  preceding  day's 
swim  had  stirred  up  excitement  amongst  crew  and  pas- 
sengers, and  they  had  chosen  their  best  man  to  swim 
with  the  Padre  that  afternoon.  When  I  saw  how 
things  stood,  I  said  to  myself,  '  Well,  here's  another 
score  for  the  Honduras  Club!  The  old  H.  C.  is  in  it 
yet !  Why,  it  is  getting  known  away  over  here  in  the 
middle  of  the  Pacific !  ' 

"  We  dined  at  the  hotel,  and  when  we  returned  to  the 
ship,  after  another  moonlight  bath,  it  was  quite  late 
—  or  rather  early  —  in  the  morning. 

"  We  stayed  in  port  from  Tuesday  afternoon  till 
Friday  morning,  and  you  may  be  sure  I  made  the 
most  of  that  time.  What  are  my  impressions  of 
Honolulu?  Well,  old  man,  it  surpasses  anything  I 
have  ever  seen,  or  hope  to  see.     The  Islands  have  been 


S6  WILLIAM  STANTON 

well  called  the  paradise  of  the  Pacific.  The  city,  out- 
side of  the  few  business  streets,  is  a  veritable  tropical 
botanical  garden.  Every  house  is  surrounded  by  lux- 
uriant palms  of  divers  kinds.  The  hedges  are  mostly 
stephanotis,  and  at  the  Kamehameha  school  there  is  a 
hedge,  three  hundred  yards  long,  of  the  night-bloom- 
ing cereus,  with  thousands  of  its  huge  blossoms  scat- 
tering their  overpowering  fragrance  on  the  moonlit 
night.  All  the  streets  are  wonderfully  smooth  and 
clean,  making  fine  bicycle  roads.  It  is  a  curious  sight 
to  see  dozens  of  Chinese  flying  down  the  street  on  a 
wheel,  pigtail  standing  out  behind.  All  the  women 
here,  apparently,  ride  horseback  astride;  not  once  did 
I  see  one  riding  otherwise. 

"  The  native  Kanakas  now  seem  lost  in  the  crowd  of 
Orientals  and  Americans.  It  is  said  the  land  is  now 
nearly  all  owned  by  the  foreigners,  many  of  them  mis- 
sionaries, who  came  here  and  civilized  the  natives  out 
of  their  possessions  and  finally  off  the  face  of  the  earth. 
In  the  midst  of  this  earthly  paradise,  the  hospitable, 
kind-hearted,  gentle  native  Hawaiian  is  now  a  stranger 
in  the  land,  robbed  of  all  he  had,  and  dying  off  rapidly 
of  diseases,  before  unknown,  which  the  white  man 
brought  to  his  once  happy  isles. 

"  Living  seems  to  be  rather  high  in  Honolulu,  at 
least  for  strangers.  One  of  our  passengers  paid  three 
dollars  for  a  breakfast  of  cofifee,  beefsteak,  and  pota- 
toes ;  another  paid  thirty-five  cents  for  two  boiled 
eggs,  and  twenty-five  cents  for  lemonade.  But  I  sup- 
pose strangers  are  easy  prey  for  the  Japs  and  Chinese 
who  run  all  the  shops.  We  all  finally  concluded  to 
take  our  meals  aboard,  else  we  were  afraid  we  should 
be  bankrupt  before  we  left  the  town. 


LETTERS  87 

"  Whilst  strolling  through  the  town,  I  found  some 
exquisite  Protestant  churches,  of  all  denominations, 
but  could  not  spy  the  Catholic  church.  I  called  a  cab, 
and  we  were  there  in  five  minutes.  The  church  is 
very  modest  in  its  exterior,  compared  with  its  Prot- 
estant neighbours,  but  the  interior  is  beautifully  dec- 
orated. From  the  church  I  went  to  the  residence  of 
the  Bishop  near-by  and  introduced  myself.  He  speaks 
English  quite  well,  and  we  were  soon  at  home  with 
each  other.  Seven  or  eight  priests  were  in  the  house 
at  the  time,  and  others  came  the  same  day.  They 
were  gathering  for  their  annual  retreat.  France,  Bel- 
gium, Germany,  and  Holland  are  represented  amongst 
them.  Several  are  old  Jesuit  boys  from  Turnhout. 
I  dined  with  them,  and  enjoyed  a  good  smoke  and 
chat  afterward.  As  the  day  happened  to  be  the  anni- 
versary of  the  Bishop's  consecration,  there  was  exposi- 
tion all  day  in  the  church,  and  I  had  a  chance  to  listen 
to  the  mellifluous  Hawaiian  language  as  the  natives 
said  their  prayers  aloud  before  the  Blessed  Sacrament. 

"  After  supper  on  board  ship,  I  returned  to  the 
church  for  solemn  benediction.  It  was  a  beautiful 
sight.  The  church  was  crowded  to  overflowing,  the 
music  was  good,  and  the  devotion  of  the  natives  was 
impressive.  After  benediction  I  had  another  smoke 
and  chat  with  the  missionaries,  and  passed  a  very 
pleasant  hour.  Next  morning  I  had  a  chance  for 
confession,  Mass,  and  Communion.  During  the  day 
I  made  an  excursion  up  the  volcano  behind  the  city, 
and  gathered  some  specimens  of  lava ;  took  another 
turn  at  the  beach;  and  after  dinner  got  oflF  some 
letters. 

"  At  six  o'clock  promptly,  next  morning,  we  left 


88  WILLIAM  STANTON 

the  wharf  on  our  long  three  weeks'  stretch.  I  re- 
gretted that  I  had  not  at  least  a  few  weeks  in  beauti- 
ful Honolulu.  Beyond  any  doubt,  there  is  a  witching 
attractiveness  in  this  garden  of  the  Pacific. 

"  During  the  first  two  days  out  from  Honolulu  I 
felt  a  little  uncomfortable  and  lost  my  appetite,  but 
was  not  what  one  would  call  sick.  Now  I  am  all 
right,  but  the  voyage  is  beginning  to  seem  very  long. 

".  .  .  Last  Saturday  Chaplain  S informed  me 

that  I  was  expected  to  conduct  '  the  Sabbath  service 
to-morrow.'  I  told  him  kindly  that  I  would  resign 
in  his  favour.  This  did  not  satisfy  him.  In  the 
morning,  he  said  I  must  officiate,  all  were  expecting 
me,  the  ladies  especially  were  most  anxious  to  hear 
me,  etc.,  etc.  I  explained  to  him  as  politely  as  possi- 
ble that  I  would  conduct  all  my  services  privately,  and 
that  if  there  was  to  be  any  public  service  he  or  the 
other  chaplain  would  have  to  carry  it  on.  As  a  matter 
of  fact  there  was  no  service,  though  many  of  the  ladies 
did  come  and  assured  me  they  would  be  '  so  delighted  ' 
if  I  would  give  the  Sabbath  address.  But  Buck  Stan- 
ton told  them  just  as  suavely  that  he  would  conduct 
no  such  service,  so  the  Sunday  passed  without  it.  A 
heavy  squall  struck  the  vessel  in  the  afternoon,  and 
many  of  the  passengers  passed  the  rest  of  the  day  in 
the  privacy  of  their  cabins. 

"  Sat.  Oct.  I2th.  The  weather  for  the  last  few  days 
has  been  very  warm  and  close  —  air  full  of  moisture. 
Everything  in  the  cabins  damp,  especially  my  smoking 
tobacco,  which  I  had  to  put  out  in  the  sun  to  dry,  else 
I  should  have  had  to  wring  the  water  out  of  it  before 
smoking.  Light  attire  is  the  order  of  the  day.  Many 
of  the  gentlemen  on  board  get  out  on  deck  in  the  early 


LETTERS  89 

hours  before  the  women  are  supposed  to  be  up,  and 
have  the  sailors  turn  the  big  fire  hose  on  them  by  way 
of  a  shower  bath.  They  have  lots  of  fun  over  their 
morning  bath,  especially  the  sailors.  The  attire  of  the 
bonton  ladies  aboard  during  these  warm  days  is  more 
varied  in  style,  but  not  more  extensive,  than  that  of 
many  of  my  Honduras  lady  friends.  I  myself  run 
about  very  modestly  clothed,  though  decidedly  neglige ; 
but  at  meals  the  gentlemen  are  all  supposed  to  appear 
in  coats,  whereas  the  ladies  —  well,  they  dispense  with 
theirs. 

"  Oct.  15.  Last  night  we  came  in  sight  of  the  long 
looked  for  Philippines.  On  our  left  the  bold  outlines 
of  Cape  Engaiio  loomed  up  out  of  the  mist  about  4:00 
P.M.  How  we  did  rejoice  at  the  sight!  We  went 
down  to  dinner  at  5  130  in  good  spirits,  but  when  we 
came  on  deck  after  the  meal  the  sea  and  sky  looked 
rather  ominous.  Soon  a  driving  rain  set  in,  accom- 
panied by  a  terrific  wind.  The  seas  broke  over  the 
deck,  and  we  crouched  about  in  odd  corners  looking  for 
protection,  for  it  was  too  stuffy  to  go  below.  We  were 
in  the  entrance  of  the  China  Sea,  right  in  the  path  of 
the  typhoons  and  during  the  usual  typhoon  month. 
Just  on  our  right  two  high  rocky  peaks  jutted  out  of 
the  waves,  marking  the  spot  where  the  ill-fated  Charles- 
ton went  down  last  year.  As  night  drew  on,  instead 
of  continuing  on  our  course  the  captain  turned  right 
about  into  the  teeth  of  the  wind  and  beat  up  and  down 
in  front  of  the  lighthouse  all  night.  At  2  :oo  a.  m.  the 
force  of  the  wind  abated,  and  we  once  more  turned  to 
our  course,  and  the  Warren  went  boldly  into  the  China 
Sea.  We  awoke  this  morning  in  full  view  of  the 
beautiful  mountainous  northern  Luzon.     The  tops  of 


90  WILLIAM  STANTON 

the  peaks  and  the  valleys  along  their  sides  were 
shrouded  in  rolling  clouds.  When  I  stepped  out  of 
my  cabin,  I  found  the  water  about  a  foot  deep  on  the 
deck ;  and  the  rolling  of  the  ship  was  slopping  the  water 
right  over  the  high  threshold,  soaking  the  floor  of  the 
cabin  and  wetting  my  bag  and  books  on  the  floor.  The 
sky  remained  cloudy  all  day,  and  the  wind  fresh.  We 
expected  to  get  into  Manila  to-morrow  morning,  but 
on  account  of  our  little  storm  we  shall  not  get  in  until 
late  to-morrow  evening,  and  consequently  shall  not  get 
to  s?hore  before  Thursday  morning.  But  at  last  our 
thirty-one  days'  sea  voyage  is  about  over. 

"  Oct.  i6,  5  :oo  p.  M.  Just  getting  into  Manila  Bay, 
passing  Corregidor  Island.  The  Transport  Sheridan 
is  coming  out,  and  we  can  send  our  mail  —  no  time  to 
lose  —  may  be  two  weeks  till  next  chance.  So  good- 
bye.    Regards  to  all  the  brethren." 


CHAPTER  VII 

Stanton,  when  he  left  St.  Louis,  had  still  a  year  of 
theology  to  do  before  he  would  be  ordained.  He 
was  to  get  through  this  year  by  private  study,  as  best 
he  could.  The  work  that  took  up  most  of  his  time, 
however,  was  in  the  Observatory,  where  a  better 
knowledge  of  English  was  needed  than  any  of  the 
Spanish  Jesuits  in  Manila  at  that  time  possessed. 
The  meteorological  work  of  the  Observatory  was  of 
immense  importance.  It  issued  weather  forecasts, 
notably  warnings  of  the  dangerous  typhoons,  which 
of  course  had  to  be  put  into  English  for  the  benefit 
of  American  and  British  skippers.  But  perhaps  it 
is  better  to  let  Stanton  reveal  himself  further  and 
speak  for  himself  of  his  impressions  of  Manila  and 
of  conditions  in  the  Islands  and  of  what  his  work 
there  was.  The  following  extracts  are  from  letters 
to  a  class-mate  in  St.  Louis. 

"  Observatorio  de  Manila,  November  21,  1901. 
"  Dear  Old  Man :     I  think  I  left  you  in  Manila  Bay, 
as  we  were  steaming  past  historic  Corregidor,  with  the 
U.  S.  Transport  Sheridan  just  starting  on  her  home- 

91 


92  WILLIAM  STANTON 

ward  voyage  and  waiting  for  whatever  mail  we  had  to 
send.  .  .  .  After  wishing  the  Sheridan  a  safe  journey 
homeward,  we  started  directly  across  the  Bay  for 
Manila,  twenty-seven  miles  distant.  To  our  right  we 
saw  the  famous  Cavite  and  the  position  of  the  un- 
fortunate Spanish  ships,  the  skeletons  of  which  are 
still  to  be  seen  rising  above  the  waves.  Darkness  came 
on  very  suddenly,  and  when  we  anchored  at  7:00  p.  m. 
nothing  could  be  seen  but  the  glimmering  lights  of 
Manila,  three  miles  away.  We  all  heaved  a  sigh  of 
relief  that  our  long  voyage  was  at  an  end. 

"  We  did  not  get  ashore,  however,  until  about  10:30 
next  morning,  Thursday,  Nov.  17.  There  is  no  pier 
as  yet,  so  we  were  taken  ashore  in  the  quartermaster's 
steam  launch.  The  view  of  the  city  from  the  Bay  is 
really  beautiful ;  the  many  churches  and  conventual 
buildings  are  very  imposing,  and  the  grand  driveway 
stretching  along  the  water-front,  with  its  avenues  of 
coconut  palms,  makes  a  most  charming  foreground.  A 
turn  around  the  breakwater  brought  us  into  the  mouth 
of  the  Pasig  River ;  and  then  we  did  have  sights  !  The 
scene  was  one  of  the  busiest  I  have  ever  witnessed  — 
steamers  and  tugs,  barges,  native  cascos,  and  smaller 
craft,  worked  their  way  up  and  down  the  sluggish 
stream.  The  cascos  were  swarming  with  natives  of  all 
sexes  and  ages,  in  every  stage  of  barbaric  dress  and 
undress ;  whilst  the  wharves  were  crowded  with  thou- 
sands of  coolies,  clad  simply  in  their  picturesque  wide 
Chinese  hats  and  very  short  nether  garments,  and  en- 
gaged in  loading  coal  into  the  barges.  The  coal  was 
carried  in  baskets  swinging  from  the  ends  of  a  bamboo 
pole  slung  over  the  bare  shoulders.  On  our  right  the 
massive  walls  of  the  old  city  loomed  up,  covered  almost 


MANILA  93 

completely  with  moss  and  various  tropical  forms  of 
vegetation.  We  soon  pulled  into  the  U.  S.  Quarter- 
master's wharf  on  the  left. 

"  Immediately  on  landing  I  hired  a  small  two- 
wheeled  carriage,  called  a  '  carreton,'  drawn  by  a 
diminutive  Filipino  horse  and  driven  by  a  cross-eyed 
native.  I  first  enquired  in  Spanish  if  he  knew  where 
the  Observatory  was,  and  being  answered  in  the  af- 
ilrmative,  I  jumped  in  and  away  we  went.  We  drove 
through  the  crowded  business  streets,  through  swarms 
of  Chinese  and  natives,  past  several  drunken  Americans 
(noble  exponents  of  Anglo-Saxon  civilization  in  the 
Philippines!),  crossed  the  Puente  de  Espana  and  out 
on  to  the  beautiful  seaside  drive  which  terminates  at 
the  historic  Luneta.  Ju«t  beyond  the  Luneta  is  the 
suburb  Hermita,  where  the  Observatorio  is  located. 
In  a  few  moments  we  turned  into  the  Calle  de  Padre 
Faura,  named  after  Father  Faura,  S.J.,  the  founder 
of  the  Observatory,  and  I  saw  the  roof  of  the  building 
looming  up  before  me. 

"  When  I  came  into  the  spacious  entrance,  the  lay 
brother  on  duty,  taking  me  for  one  of  the  curious 
Americanos  who  wanted  to  see  the  Observatory,  was 
about  to  show  me  the  card  on  which  are  printed  the 
days  and  hours  for  visitors,  for  this  happened  not  to 
be  a  visiting  day.  But  when  I  asked  for  Fr.  Algue, 
he  thought  I  might  be  on  some  official  business,  and 
accordingly  showed  me  up  to  his  office.  Fr.  A.  was 
taken  completely  by  surprise.  He  knew  that  I  was  to 
come,  but  had  no  definite  idea  of  the  time  when  I  was 
to  put  in  an  appearance,  and  I  had  not  had  a  chance 
to  send  word  beforehand.  He  welcomed  me  most  cor- 
dially and  introducd  me  in  a  few  minutes  to  the  rector 


94  WILLIAM  STANTON 

and  the  whole  community.  I  find  myself  the  only 
English-speaking  man  in  the  place.  Of  course  Fr. 
Algue  speaks  English  fairly  well,  and  the  three  scholas- 
tics know  a  few  words,  but  the  entire  community  is 
Spanish  and  nearly  all  are  from  Catalonia.  They  seem 
to  be  very  fine  fellows  and  do  their  best  to  make  the 
poor  Americano  feel  at  home ;  and  they  are  succeeding 
very  well. 

"  I  should  never  end,  should  I  attempt  to  describe  all 
the  interesting  things  that  have  struck  me  during  the 
first  few  days  in  Manila ;  hence  I  shall  confine  myself, 
for  the  present  at  least,  to  a  few  points  concerning  our 
communities  in  the  city.  We  have  two  communities 
here,  quite  distinct:  one  here  at  the  Observatory,  the 
other  at  the  Ateneo  Municipal,  within  the  walled  city, 
where  the  superior  of  the  mission  lives.  The  Ateneo 
is  a  college,  with  over  eleven  hundred  boys,  about  370 
of  whom  are  boarders.  With  perhaps  a  dozen  excep- 
tions, all  the  boys  are  native  Filipinos  or  mestizos ;  and 
there  are  75  native  servants  employed  in  the  college  and 
house.  They  have  a  fine  museum  of  natural  history, 
containing  very  complete  collections  of  the  fauna,  flora, 
and  ethnology  of  the  Philippine  Islands.  The  build- 
ings are  of  three  stories  and  spread  over  a  considerable 
area,  with  enclosed  courts,  wide  corridors,  and  very 
thick  walls.  They  are  within  a  stone's  throw  of  the 
beach,  and  from  the  upper  stories  or  roofs  a  magnifi- 
cent view  of  the  Bay  is  obtainable.  Here  they  had  a 
grand-stand  view  of  the  manceuvering  of  Dewey's 
fleet  during  the  whole  performance.  Our  buildings, 
together  with  the  Augustinian  convent  adjoining, 
would  have  made  one  of  the  most  conspicuous  targets 
had  the  city  been  bombarded.     Owing  to  the  want  of 


MANILA  95 

space  and  the  scattered  arrangement  of  the  buildings, 
Ours  are  now  thinking  of  building  anew  and  trans- 
ferring the  Ateneo  to  a  more  convenient  part  of  the 
city.  It  is  a  great  sight  when  classes  are  over  to  see 
the  vast  crowd  of  young  Filipinos  surging  out  from  the 
school. 

"  Adjoining  the  Ateneo  is  our  famous  church  of  San 
Ignacio,  with  its  exquisite  interior,  one  mass  of  won- 
derful wood  carving,  all  done  by  native  Filipinos. 
There  is  a  book  with  plates  in  the  library  at  St.  Louis 
which  describes  all  the  details  of  this  truly  grand 
edifice. 

"  Flere  at  the  Observatory  the  main  building  is  an 
immense  hollow  square,  one  corner  of  which  is  devoted 
to  the  meteorological  observatory.  The  community  oc- 
cupies two  sides  of  the  quadrangle  on  the  upper  floor, 
whilst  the  rest  of  the  building  is  devoted  to  the  college, 
which  is  known  as  the  '  Escuela  Normal '  or  Normal 
School.  There  are  about  700  boys  attending  the 
classes,  some  200  of  whom  are  boarders.  The  rooms 
are  all  large,  with  high  ceilings  and  very  thick  walls. 
My  own  room  measures  on  the  inside  about  18  x  48 
feet.  A  very  wide  and  high  double  door  opens  out  in 
front  upon  a  sort  of  balcony  with  sliding  blinds. 
Across  the  road  is  about  as  typical  a  Filipino  village 
as  one  could  find  anywhere. 

"  All  around  the  inner  side  of  the  quadrangle  runs 
an  enclosed  corridor  or  cloister,  some  25  or  30  feet 
wide.  On  the  ground  floor  it  is  paved  with  cement, 
making  a  fine  walk  ;  whilst  on  the  second  story  the  floor 
is  of  hand  polished  Filipino  mahogany,  as  are  also  the 
floors  of  all  our  rooms.  All  the  rooms  on  the  ground 
floor  are  paved  with  smooth  tiles. 


96  WILLIAM  STANTON 

"  The  gardens  or  grounds  surrounding  the  building 
cover  about  ten  acres,  filled  with  tropical  vegetation. 
The  magnetical  observatory  and  astronomical  observa- 
tory occupy  distinct  buildings  in  the  garden.  We  have 
our  own  printing,  lithographing,  and  binding  establish- 
ment on  the  grounds.  The  whole  observatory  plant 
is  one  of  the  best  institutions  of  its  kind  in  the  world. 

"  Nov.  23.  Since  my  arrival  we  have  had  two 
typhoons  which  swept  across  the  Islands,  one  a  bit 
north  of  Manila,  the  other  south.  The  Manila  papers 
say  that  the  former  caught  the  Sheridan  —  the  boat 
carrying  my  previous  letter  —  and  handled  her  so  badly 
that  she  has  had  to  be  laid  up  for  several  weeks'  re- 
pairs in  Nagasaki,  whilst  the  Warren  has  been  de- 
spatched thither  to  take  on  to  the  States  her  mail  and 
as  many  of  the  passengers  and  disabled  soldiers  as  she 
can  accommodate. 

"  The  storm  mentioned  in  my  last  letter  (which  we 
encountered  around  the  northern  point  of  Luzon) 
proved  to  be  the  outer  edge  of  a  typhoon  which  swept 
across  Manila  Bay,  doing  great  damage  to  part  of  the 
shipping  through  the  negligence  of  some  of  our  Ameri- 
can captains,  who  of  course  '  know  all  about  every- 
thing.' The  Observatory  had  sent  them  word  thirty- 
six  hours  before  the  first  appearance  of  the  actual 
storm,  but  they  neglected  to  take  precautions  until  it 
was  too  late.  These  wise  men  will  probably  heed  our 
warnings  in  the  future. 

"And  what  about  the  weather?  Well,  it  has  been 
moist,  moist,  moist,  even  with  the  sun  shining,  but  not 
unpleasantly  hot.  The  nights  are  delightfully  cool, 
and  the  mosquitos  have  not  bothered  me  —  under  the 
net. 


MANILA  97 

"  We  are  of  course  Spanish  in  our  customs  here,  and 
many  of  them  would  sit  rather  strangely,  I  imagine, 
upon  some  of  the  brethren  of  the  Collegium  Maximum 
of  St.  Louis.  However,  I  think  I  am  catching  on 
pretty  well,  all  things  considered.  I  find  coat,  vest, 
and  trousers  superfluities.  It  will  not  do  to  go  into 
too  many  particulars ;  but  I  am  sure  that  my  old  friend 
L would  have  a  fit  if  he  caught  sight  of  me  wan- 
dering about  the  streets  of  Manila  in  my  Spanish 
cassock,  closed  in  front  (for  excellent  reasons),  long 

Spanish  mantle  (manteo),  something  like  Fr.  C 's 

big  cloak,  only  very  light  and  reaching  almost  to  the 
ground,  and  to  crown  all  one  of  those  black  clerical 
hats  with  flat  round  top,  very  wide  brim,  and  rolled  up 
at  the  sides ! 

"  The  daily  order  is  about  as  follows :  Rise  at  4 :30, 
meditation  and  Mass  as  usual ;  breakfast,  or  rather 
coffee  or  chocolate,  right  after  Mass;  11:30,  examen, 
litanies ;  dinner  at  noon.  Recreation  walking  always, 
*  a  la  Frangaise '  I  believe.  At  a  quarter  of  eight, 
supper  and  recreation  in  the  same  way,  examen,  points 
of  meditation,  and  retire  at  9 130.  There  are  no 
springs  or  mattrasses  on  our  beds.  A  thin  Filipino 
mat,  something  like  a  Chinese  tea-sack,  is  unrolled  on 
a  cane  concern  stretched  across  the  bed-frame.  On 
this  you  put  some  sheets,  and  if  the  night  be  cold,  a 
light  blanket  is  at  hand. 

".  .  .  There  are  a  few  other  customs  with  which  we 
are  not  familiar  in  the  States,  but  I  think  I  can  ac- 
commodate myself  pretty  well.  The  Society  is  still 
the  same  all  the  world  over,  and  national  and  local 
differences  are  after  all  mere  trifles  which  should  not 
disturb  a  man's  peace  of  soul. 


98  WILLIAM  STANTON 

"  November  29. 

"  Here  I  am  again.  I  am  pretty  well  settled  down  to 
work  now.  What  with  my  theology,  observatory 
work,  various  dealings  with  American  officials  and 
visitors,  Customs  House  and  divers  other  houses,  the 
days  do  not  hang  heavy  on  my  hands.  I  knock  great 
fun  out  of  some  things.  With  my  native  ginger- 
bread complexion,  and  togged  out  in  a  complete  Span- 
ish Padre's  outfit,  I  am  sure  I  am  a  sight.  Every 
American  I  have  met  took  me  for  an  out-and-out 
Spanish  Padre,  or  friar,  or  some  such  thing.  It's  a 
regular  circus !  This  very  morning  I  was  down  at  the 
Customs  House  with  one  of  our  lay  brothers  to  see 
about  some  packages  waiting  for  us  there.  The  clerk 
started  jabbering  away  in  Spanish  in  a  rather  lacka- 
daisical way,  as  if  it  did  not  matter  much  to  him 
whether  or  not  we  got  our  packages  or  how  long  we 
might  have  to  wait  for  them.  I  let  him  go  on  for  a 
bit.  When  I  was  tired,  I  said,  '  Well,  see  here,  per- 
haps we  can  manage  things  in  a  more  business-like  way 
if  we  go  at  it  in  English.'  You  should  have  seen  the 
expression  on  that  fellow's  face.     He  said,  '  Well,  I 

be  d ! '     And  after  that  was  as  attentive  as  one 

could  wish. 

"  Last  Thursday  we  went  out  to  the  villa,  or  '  casa 
de  campo.'  It  is  situated  on  the  banks  of  the  Pasig 
River  in  a  village  called  Santa  Ana,  a  few  miles  from 
town.  We  passed  along  the  road  and  over  the  bridge 
where  the  first  shots  were  exchanged  between  our 
troops  and  the  Filipinos.  The  walls,  floors,  and  ceil- 
ings of  the  villa  itself  are  punctured  and  scored  all 
over  with  bullet  holes.  The  house  was  first  taken  over 
by  the  Spanish  soldiers  as  a  hospital,  then  the  in- 


MANILA  99 

surgfents  drove  the  Spaniards  into  the  city  and  used 
the  place  as  a  barracks,  next  the  Americans  chased  out 
the  FiHpinos  and  occupied  it  as  a  hospital,  and  now  it 
is  back  once  more  to  its  original  purpose.  The  house 
itself  is  a  large,  cool,  and  convenient  building,  but  the 
grounds  about  it  are  rather  small.  The  Pasig  flows 
deep  and  swift  at  its  very  door,  and  you  may  imagine 
the  temptation  I  had  to  take  a  plunge  into  its  pleasant 
depths  and  try  my  strength  against  the  current,  but  — 
I  am  a  Spanish  Padre  now,  and  we  do  not  do  such 
things.  I  am  told  that  during  the  long  vacations 
which  are  spent  here  at  the  villa,  some  of  the  reckless 
spirits  amongst  the  brethren  slip  down  at  nightfall,  tie 
a  rope  about  their  waist,  make  the  other  end  of  it  fast 
to  an  iron  ring  in  the  stone  landing,  and  thus  take  a 
bath.  I  am  anxiously  looking  forward  to  see  how  the 
operation  is  carried  out.  I  hope  we  shan't  have  to 
wear  hats  and  shoes !  .  .  . 

"  Observatorio  de  Manila,  December  lo,  1901. 

"  Dear  R .     Your  letter  dated  October  6  reached 

me  on  the  feast  of  St.  Stanislaus,  after  what  I  presume 
was  an  uneventful  voyage,  but  my  last  two  to  you  have 
had  some  experiences.  For  the  Sheridan,  which 
carried  the  first  of  them,  was  badly  done  up  by  a  tor- 
nado and  put  into  Yokahama  for  repairs.  The  War- 
ren, carrying  the  second,  set  out  for  Manila  to  take 
over  the  mail  and  passengers  of  the  Sheridan.  But 
before  she  got  to  the  Sheridan  she  herself  struck  a 
reef  and  ripped  ofif  some  plates  and  broke  a  few  ribs, 
so  that  a  third  transport  had  to  be  sent  to  aid  her. 
However,  I  hope  both  letters  have  arrived  safely  at 
their  destination. 


100  WILLIAM  STANTON 

".  .  .  Father  Algue  and  the  other  Spanish  fathers 
connected  with  the  Observatory  are  placed  in  a  very 
anomalous  situation.  They  have  been  officially  in- 
formed by  the  Spanish  Government  that  according  to 
Spanish  law  they  have  forfeited  their  right  of  nation- 
ality or  citizenship  by  taking  the  oath  of  office  under 
a  foreign  Government.  On  the  other  hand,  no 
foreigner  in  the  Philippines  (nor  Filipino)  is  allowed 
by  our  law  to  become  an  American  citizen.  So  the 
poor  chaps  have  no  nationality,  are  not  recognized  as 
citizens  of  any  country  on  earth !  Quite  a  predica- 
ment, isn't  it? 

"  Fr.  S has  just  returned  to  Manila  after  an 

absence  of  three  months.  He  has  been  establishing 
various  new  meteorological  stations  in  the  northern 
and  southern  parts  of  Luzon.  He  was  detained  nearly 
two  months  in  Antimonon,  a  small  town  in  the  south, 
waiting  for  some  boat  to  take  him  to  Manila.  Travel- 
ling facilities  here  don't  seem  to  be  much  better  than  in 
Honduras ! 

"December  15.!!!!!!!!!!! 

"Land  of  Moses!  Talk  about  forces  of  nature! 
Give  me  thunder-storms,  typhoons  and  tornados,  but 
please  pass  me  by  when  it  comes  to  a  good-sized 
'  temblor  '  or  earthquake !  We  have  just  had  a  terrific 
shake  this  rrwrning.  I've  never  had  such  sensations  in 
my  life  before.  It  was  the  most  unearthly  feeling  one 
can  imagine.  I  had  just  knelt  down  in  chapel  for  a 
visit  after  my  morning  coffee,  when  I  felt  the  whole 
house  tremble  violently ;  grating,  rumbling  sounds  ac- 
companied the  movement ;  the  heavy  walls,  some  four 
feet  thick,  swayed  back  and  forth,  and  the  floor  rose 
and  fell  with  a  sickly,  jerky  motion.     I  remained  quiet 


MANILA  loi 

for  about  fifteen  seconds,  thinking  it  would  be  over  in 
a  moment.  But  finding  that  things  were  getting  worse, 
I  bolted  out  of  the  door,  down  the  steps  three  at  a 
time,  got  out  on  the  heaving  ground  in  the  center  of 
the  patio  or  interior  court,  and  looked  around  to  see 
the  boys  piling  out  of  their  chapel  door  and  making 
for  my  own  position  en  masse.  Most  of  them  threw 
themselves  on  their  knees  and  poured  forth  their 
prayers  and  acts  of  contrition  in  a  most  pitiable  tone. 
I  shall  never  forget  that  scene.  The  boys  had  been 
listening  to  an  instruction  from  Fr.  Rector  after  Mass, 
but  nothing  could  restrain  their  wild  instinct  of  self- 
preservation.  The  ground  still  continued  to  heave  and 
fall,  the  huge  walls  swung  first  one  way  then  another 
until  I  thought  surely  the  whole  edifice  was  about  to 
collapse,  the  great  trees  in  the  patio  swayed  back  and 
forth  like  so  many  reeds.  But  the  staunch  building 
remained  uninjured.  I  thought  the  quake  would  never 
end ;  but  suddenly  it  was  all  over,  and  no  harm  done, 
at  least  in  our  quarters.  But  in  the  city  several  houses 
were  tumbled  down  and  the  arches  of  several  churches 
demolished.  This  has  been  the  most  severe  quake  felt 
in  Manila  since  1880,  and  the  longest  in  duration :  it 
lasted  more  than  a  minute  and  a  half.  Comparatively 
little  harm  was  done,  however,  owing  to  the  fact  that, 
though  the  vibrations  were  longer  than  usual,  they 
succeeded  each  other  more  slowly  than  in  smaller  earth- 
quakes of  greater  suddenness.  .  .  . 

"  December  16,  a.  m. 
"  Another  earthquake,  but  very  slight,  this  morning 
at  about  the  same  hour  as  yesterday's  —  and  three 
more  yesterday  afternoon  and  evening!  little  fellows. 


102  WILLIAM  STANTON 

Things  seem  to  be  getting  lively  down  below  —  must 
be  having  a  big  dance  on. 

"  I  visited  a  model  Filipino  cigar  factory  the  other 
day ;  went  all  through  it.  It  is  a  small  one,  owned  and 
carried  on  entirely  by  natives,  and  employs  about  three 
hundred  men  and  women.  Above  the  factory  itself 
live  the  proprietor  and  his  family.  The  greater  part 
of  this  upper  story  is  devoted  to  a  beautiful  chapel, 
nearly  the  size  of  the  University  chapel  in  St,  Louis, 
finished  in  hard  woods,  decorated  artistically  with  carv- 
ings, oil  paintings,  and  frescos ;  everything  in  exquisite 
taste.  Here  all  the  employees  hear  Mass  daily  —  and 
go  through  the  Spiritual  Exercises  for  five  days  every 
year!  Just  imagine  such  a  thing  in  our  St.  Louis  to- 
bacco factories !  But  here  we  have  Catholic  Filipinos, 
whose  religion  is  not  put  on  for  one  day  of  the  week, 
like  their  Sunday  clothes. 

"  Tell  McG to  try  to  imagine  what  his  sensa- 
tions would  be  with  his  curved  beak  hooked  under  the 
eye-piece  of  our  superb  twenty-inch  telescope,  whilst 
he  scanned  the  equatorial  belt  and  the  southern  con- 
stellations !  .  .  ." 

This  is  from  a  letter  to  the  man  who  succeeded 
him  in  Belize : 

"  Observatorio  de  Manila,  December  i8,  1901. 
".  .  .  The  museum  at  the  Ateneo  is  a  gem.     Fr. 
S has  a  Filipino  taxidermist  at  work  there  the 


whole  year  round  preparing  and  mounting  specimens, 
and  he's  a  daisy.     There  are  a  dozen  or  more  speci- 
mens of  stuffed  bbas,  one  of  them  measuring  twenty- 
four  feet  in  length. 
"  You  ask  if  I  have  found  amongst  the  Filipinos 


MANILA  103 

the  equals  of  Goyo  and  Lucio  for  bush  companions. 
Well,  I  have  not  had  a  chance  to  see  the  bush  yet,  and 
I  have  nothing  to  do  with  the  boys  at  present,  except 
to  take  a  walk  with  them  on  recreation  days  through 
the  streets  of  Manila  and  its  suburbs.  They  always 
march  in  line,  two  or  three  abreast,  and  I  tell  you  they 
make  a  natty  appearance  in  their  trim  uniforms,  spot- 
less white  trousers,  snug-fitting  dark  blue  jackets  with 
gilt  buttons,  and  dark  blue  cap  trimmed  in  gold.  They 
usually  go  in  bands  of  about  a  hundred  or  a  hundred 
and  fifty.  Of  course  we  always  wear  the  ca-ssock,  and 
are  marks  on  the  street.  I'd  give  a  farm  to  be  able  to 
take  an  occasional  stroll,  barefooted,  along  the  shore 
where  the  waves  roll  in  from  the  bay,  as  we  could  do 
at  Stann  Creek  or  outside  Belize,  or  take  a  decent 
sprint  along  the  roads  without  being  wrapped  up  from 
head  to  feet  in  a  long  cassock  and  manteo.  The  waters 
of  Manila  Bay  are  tossing  scarcely  more  than  a  stone's 
throw  away,  and  on  Thursdays  at  our  villa  the  deep 
Pasig  runs  directly  before  our  door  ;  yet  I  have  not  had 
a  swim  since  I  left  the  incomparable  Waikiki  beach 
near  Honolulu.  But  this  is  Manila,  not  Missouri  or 
Belize.  .  .  .  What  a  dull  world  this  would  be  if  we 
all  had  the  same  ideas  !  .  .  . 

"  On  the  feast  of  St.  Francis  Xavier  the  patron  of 
the  Normal  School,  the  boarders  gave  a  play,  entitled 
St.  Stanislaus,  in  the  open  patio.  The  stage  setting  was 
fine,  the  costumes  rich,  and  the  acting  of  -the  young 
Filipinos  very  creditable;  the  only  thing  to  mar  the 
effect  was  the  absence  of  foot-lights,  which  left  the 
faces  of  the  actors  three  times  as  dark  as  they  naturally 
are.  After  the  whole  affair,  when  the  crowd  had  dis- 
persed, the  band  kept  on  playing  till  late  in  the  night ; 


I04  WILLIAM  STANTON 

so  we  had  up  a  number  of  the  boys  to  go  through 
various  native  and  Spanish  dances.  I  must  say  that 
the  popular  Spanish  dance  is  the  most  beautiful  thing 
of  its  sort  I  have  ever  witnessed.  None  of  our  Ameri- 
can dances  can  come  near  it  for  grace. 

".  .  .  We  have  had  two  quakes  to-day,  but  very 
slight  ones.  But  I  may  tell  you  right  here  that  in  the 
Philippines  terra  firma  is  a  misnomer.  Our  microseis- 
mometers  at  the  Observatory  show  that  we  are  never 
still  here. 

".  .  .  We  have  land  snails  here  in  Mindanao  which 
live  in  the  tops  of  trees  and  have  shells  as  big  as  your 
fist  and  beautifully  coloured.  Among  the  bivalves  in 
the  sea  down  about  Tacloban  lives  the  Tridacna  gigas, 
measuring  more  than  three  feet  across  and  weighing 
hundreds  of  pounds.  I  have  seen  a  number  of  such 
specimens,  but  of  course  they  are  not  easy  to  get 
hold  of. 

".  .  .  How  is  the  Honduras  Club?  Hope  it  isn't 
raided  too  often !  I  don't  imagine  it  would  flourish  in 
this  climate." 

To  his  aunt,  Mrs.  Siedekum,  he  writes  on  Febru- 
ary 7,  1902: 

".  .  .  Affairs  in  the  Philippines  are  in  a  very  mixed 
up  state,  politically,  materially,  and  religiously.  Al- 
though organized  resistance  is  over,  fighting  is  still 
going  on  in  several  of  the  provinces,  and  I  am  con- 
vinced that  there  can  be  no  permanent  peace  for  years 
to  come.  The  natives  who  have  submitted  cannot  be 
trusted ;  unless  a  garrison  is  at  hand  there  is  fear  of 
an  uprising  at  any  time.     They  dream  only  of  inde- 


MANILA  105 

pendence,  but  I  feel  sure  that  if  it  were  given  them  in 
the  near  future,  the  country  would  return  to  perfect 
savagery;  for  the' Filipino  without  the  softening  and 
civilizing  influence  of  religion  is  the  worst  of  sav- 
ages. 

"  The  Filipinos  were  a  happy  and  contented  people 
until  a  few  natives  educated  in  Europe  returned  with- 
out faith  or  morals  and  began  founding  secret  lodges 
of  the  terrible  society  known  as  the  Katipunan. 
Nearly  all  the  natives  are  simple,  good  Catholics,  with 
the  exception  of  a  few  dozens  of  renegades  who  consti- 
tute '  The  Federal  Party.'  Here  in  Manila  the  natives 
are  becoming  corrupted  by  contact  with  the  American 
soldier,  and  are  no  longer  as  decent  as  they  were  a  few 
years  ago. 

"  There  are  two  important  American  papers  pub- 
lished here  in  Manila,  both  rabidly  anti-Friar  and  anti- 
Catholic.  The  most  outrageous  calumnies,  lies  and  ex- 
aggerations, are  daily  printed  about  the  Friars.  These 
papers  are  worse  than  any  A.P.A.  sheet  I  ever  laid  eyes 
on,  and  of  course  the  secular  papers  in  the  States  take 
their  news  from  such  sources.  They  are  not  only 
bigoted  but  densely  ignorant  of  everything  connected 
with  the  Catholic  Religion.  Still,  and  it  seems  strange, 
there  is  never  a  word  said  against  the  Jesuits.  We  are 
running  the  entire  Weather  Bureau  of  the  archipelago, 
and  outside  of  the  five  fathers  and  myself  all  the  other 
observers  here  and  throughout  the  islands  are  native 
Filipinos  trained  here  in  the  Observatory. 

"  Our  Government  has  forced  its  irreligious  public 
school  system  on  the  Filipinos,  but  everywhere  the 
Catholics  are  opening  private  Catholic  schools,  and  as 
these  are  opened  the  public  schools  become  empty  and 


io6  WILLIAM  STANTON 

the  Catholic  schools  filled,  since  the  natives  do  not  care 
to  have  their  children  brought  up  as  atheists.  Many 
young  women  have  come  here  from  the  States  to  teach 
school.  .  .  .  The  Philippines  are  no  place  for  a  decent 
unmarried  American  woman. 

"  Our  soldiers  are  now  following  the  reconcentrado 
plan  in  the  disturbed  provinces,  notwithstanding  the 
fact  that  they  could  not  find  words  strong  enough  to 
curse  it  with  when  the  *  cruel  Spaniards  '  followed  the 
same  plan.  They  are  burning  the  towns  in  the  dis- 
tricts and  forcing  the  natives  to  gather  along  the  tele- 
graph lines  or  be  treated  as  traitors.  The  troops,  both 
officers  and  men,  are  tired  of  war  and  anxious  to  get 
home,  for  war  in  a  country  and  climate  like  this  is  a 
more  than  ordinarily  terrible  thing.  What  the  out- 
come will  be,  it  is  hard  to  see  just  now.  One  officer 
said  to  me,  '  I  wish  to  God  Dewey  had  never  seen 
Manila ! ' 

"  The  American  Government  has  a  white  elephant  on 
its  hands,  and  naturally  doesn't  know  what  to  do  with 
it.  It  is  costing  millions  of  money  and  thousands  of 
lives  —  and  still  there  is  no  end  in  sight.  The  Fihpino 
people  are  undoubtedly  unable  to  govern  themselves ; 
if  left  to  themselves  would  revert  to  savagery  and  con- 
stant tribal  warfare.  Spain  never  did  subdue  them  by 
force  of  arms.  It  was  the  Christian  influence  of  the 
Spanish  missionaries  that  won  these  Malays,  and  then 
protected  them  from  the  injustice  of  grasping  and  un- 
scrupulous governors.  They  made  of  them  a  peaceful, 
happy.  Christian  people,  who  continued  so  until  they 
were  stirred  up  a  few  years  ago  by  the  secret  lodges 
led  blindly  by  a  few  crafty  educated  men,  many  of 
whom  are  now  receiving  fat  salaries  in  the  employ  of 


MANILA  107 

the  American  Government  whilst  at  the  same  time 
secretly  helping  the  insurgents.  They  are  men  who 
would  sell  their  own  mothers  or  fathers  for  a  handful 
of  gold ;  and  they  are  the  men  who  are  crying  for  the 
expulsion  of  all  the  religious  orders  from  the  is- 
lands. .  .  . 

"  Of  course  the  greatest  noise  is  made  about  the 
immorality  of  the  friars.  Now  the  truth  is  that,  just 
as  in  the  States  we  have  a  few  sacrilegious  '  ex-priests  ' 
and  '  ex-nuns  '  who  have  been  a  disgrace  to  their  call- 
ing, so  also  in  the  Philippines  a  few  unfortunate  men 
have  proved  unfaithful  to  their  vows,  a  disgrace  to 
themselves,  and  a  scandal  to  the  Church  and  their 
neighbour.  But  to  accuse  the  friars,  as  a  body,  of  im- 
morality, is  as  unjust  as  it  would  be  to  accuse  the 
American  clergy  of  unfaithfulness  on  account  of  the 
bad  lives  of  their  '  ex-priests.'  There  was  a  Judas 
amongst  the  Apostles ;  there  will  probably  be  Judases 
until  the  judgment  day ;  for  the  devil  does  his  utmost 
of  course  to  destroy  God's  chosen  souls.  And  the 
enemies  of  the  Church  are  almost  insanely  eager  to 
make  the  most  of  such  scandals  as  do  happen." 

To  a  class-mate  in  St.  Louis,  on  February  17, 
1902: 

".  .  .  At  present  there  is  nothing  very  exciting  going 
on.  Since  the  establishment  of  '  The  Philippine 
Weather  Bureau  '  by  our  Government,  a  *  Crop  Serv- 
ice '  has  become  an  essential  part  of  its  work.  Al- 
though I  always  have  been  something  of  a  '  hayseed ' 
and  a  wild  man  of  the  bush,  I  never  dreamed  of  run- 
ning a  farm,  a  threshing  machine,  or  a  Crop  Service. 


io8  WILLIAM  STANTON 

Yet  here  I  am,  looking  after  the  '  Crop  Service  '  of  the 
PhiHppine  Islands  and  studying  economic  entomology. 
Bugs,  Bugs,  Bugs !  Little  bugs,  big  bugs,  every  bug 
that  takes  a  bite  at  the  crops  of  the  Islands,  have  all 
been  handed  over  to  my  tender  mercies.  .  .  . 

".  .  .  The  theological  department  is  of  course  going 
along  quietly  and  unostentatiously  at  the  same  time. 
I  am  on  friendly  terms  with  Perrone  and  Sabetti.  I 
passed  my  Second  Volume  around  Christmas,  and 
expect  to  pass  *  ad  audiendas '  about  the  end  of  the 
present  month. 

"  The  scholastic  year  closes  here  on  March  9,  on 
which  day  the  '  Normal '  will  have  its  exhibition  and 
distribution.  I  have  three  young  Filipinos  in  training 
for  a  little  comedy  sketch  in  English  which  I  have 
scribbled  for  the  occasion.  A  few  weeks  ago  we  had 
the  quarterly  public  disputation  of  the  philosophy  class 
at  the  Ateneo,  when  the  natives  defended  their  theses 
in  ontology  and  ethics  very  ably  against  all  comers ;  and 
all  in  Latin,  remember!  I  am  afraid  the  philosophers 
in  our  Missouri  colleges  would  feel  rather  small  if  they 
ran  up  against  our  '  savages '  in  such  a  contest.  The 
course  at  the  Ateneo  is  certainly  very  complete,  and 
their  A.B.  is  given  only  after  a  second  year  of 
philosophy.  .  .  . 

".  .  .  The  press  and  the  Protestant  ministers  are 
doing  their  best  to  pervert  the  faith  of  the  poor  people 
here.  But  what  is  true  of  the  Latin  races,  is  true  all 
the  world  over  of  the  Indian  tribes  who  have  received 
the  true  faith  at  their  hands  :  you  may  succeed  in  mak- 
ing bad  Catholics  of  them,  but  you  can  never  make 
them  Protestants.  I  have  heard  that  the  Protestants 
are  making  reports  of  great  numbers  of  converts  in 


MANILA  109 

the  American  papers ;  but  it  is  only  a  repetition  of  their 
old  tactics  —  it's  all  a  big,  big  lie.  The  ministers  make 
a  great  noise  advertising  their  services,  and  preach 
before  a  couple  of  dozen  lazy  cocheros  and  muchachos 
who  are  lounging  around  trying  to  kill  time  and  drop 
in  to  see  what  is  going  on.  Protestant  bibles  are  dis- 
tributed, and  a  grand  report  sent  back  to  the  missionary 
and  bible  societies  at  home  who  are  supplying  the 
millions.  In  the  meantime  the  cochcro  strolls  off,  and 
rolls  his  cigarettes  with  leaves  from  the  bibles,  starts 
his  fire  to  boil  his  rice,  or  puts  them  to  more  ignomini- 
ous uses.  .  .  . 

"  The  great  day  is  coming  along  pretty  rapidly,  old 
man,  so  don't  forget  to  pray  hard  for  the  solitary  one 
in  the  far  east." 

From  a  letter  to  another  scholastic  in  St.  Louis, 
March  3 : 

".  .  .  Fr.  S and  I,  a  few  weeks  ago,  went  over 

across  the  Bay  to  the  famous  Cavite,  to  look  after  the 
establishment  of  a  meteorological  station.  We  passed 
within  arm's  length  of  the  rusting  skeletons  of  the 
Spanish  ships  which  Dewey  sent  to  the  bottom.  There 
are  two  of  our  Fathers  in  the  town  taking  the  place  of 
the  friars  who  have  decamped  to  Manila.  Whilst 
looking  for  the  Fathers'  residence,  we  entered  one  of 
the  deserted  churches  and  the  attached  monastery. 
Talk  about  your  desolation  of  desolations !  nothing  but 
the  solid  walls,  roof,  and  stone  partitions  left ;  every- 
thing else  smashed  or  carried  away,  even  the  stone  slabs 
of  the  pavement.  But  the  convent  itself  was  not  de- 
serted, not  by  any  means.     It  was  filled  with  filth  and 


no  WILLIAM  STANTON 

a  couple  of  hundred  Indians  living  in  the  friars'  rooms, 
several  families  in  each  room,  and  at  least  half  a  dozen 
cocks  in  each,  tied  to  the  various  articles  of  rubbish. 
The  rest  of  the  description  I  must  prudently  omit, 
merely  remarking  that  Saturdays  at  the  mouth  of 
Stann  Creek  couldn't  begin  to  compare  with  the  in- 
terior of  that  convent.  .  .  .  The  Carib  is  very  tame 
alongside  of  the  Filipino!  But  don't  imagine  I  have 
gone  back  on  the  Caribs  —  even  though  the  future  Fr. 
K.  will  take  good  care  of  them.  Do  oranges  still  dis- 
appear from  sick  men's  rooms?  If  so,  tell  Patrick 
the  Broad-backed  that  we  have  three  or  four  dozen 
orange  trees  in  our  garden  here ;  let  him  come  over. 
Has  Mankato  Bill  finished  his  *  morals '  yet  ?  and  is  it 
true  that  the  Count  has  shrieked  all  the  remaining 
hairs  ofif  his  head  when  assisting  you  in  stringing 
wires?  .  .  . 

"  Glad  to  hear  Mr.  B.  has  taken  my  place  in  defend- 
ing our  much-maligned  mahogany  mission.  Truth  is 
bound  to  prevail  in  the  end.  But  here's  something 
on  the  quiet  which  you  must  tell  Phil  (of  course  not 
whilst  any  of  the  scoffers  at  Belize  are  around).  I 
was  piloting  through  the  Observatory,  a  few  weeks  ago, 
the  captain  of  an  English  First-Class  Cruiser  and  the 
Chief  Justice  of  one  of  His  Majesty's  colonies.  One 
of  the  gentlemen,  I  found,  thought  that  Belize  was 
somewhere  in  South  America,  the  other  that  it  was  the 
same  as  British  Guiana ! ! ! ! ! 

"  I  had  a  letter  from  Fr.  H.  the  other  day,  from 
China,  saying  that  as  yet  he  has  received  no  orders  to 
prepare  for  Manila.  It's  a  great  pity;  there  is  not  a 
single  American  priest  in  the  whole  archipelago,  out- 
side of  three  or  four  chaplains  who  are  of  course  '  hik- 


MANILA  in 

ing '  with  their  soldier  boys.  English-speaking  priests 
for  the  ministry  are  sadly  needed  here  at  present, 
whilst  unfortunately  there  are  some  dozens  of  '  preach- 
ers '  trying  to  pervert  the  natives ;  not  however  in 
parts  where  there  is  danger  to  life  and  limb,  but  in 
comfortable  quarters  here  in  Manila  or  other  safe 
domiciles.  .  .  . 

"...  If  you  happen  to  run  across  anything  inter- 
esting on  bugs,  just  send  it  along,  for  as  you  may  know, 
I  have  charge  of  the  '  Crop  Service '  of  the  Weather 
Bureau,  and  am  up  to  my  ears  in  the  economic  ento- 
mology of  the  Philippines.  Bugs  do  come  in  handy 
sometimes,  after  all  —  who  would  imagine  it ! 

*'  Well,  adios !  for  the  present.  Greetings  to  all  the 
brethren  especially  to  the  stand-bys  of  the  *  Club.' 
And  don't  forget  the  old  Carib  in  your  prayers,  espe- 
cially as  the  end  of  the  year  draws  near. 

"  P.S.  I  must  not  forget  a  most  extraordinary 
event.  I  had  a  breakfast  this  morning,  the  first  since 
my  arrival  in  Manila.  I  am  sure  you  sympathize  with 
me.  Our  usual  so-called  breakfast  consists  of  coffee 
and  dry  bread ;  but  this  morning  we  celebrated  the  end 
of  the  school  year  luxuriously  with  real  beefsteak, 
eggs,  fried  chippies,  (real  chippies,  you  needn't  laugh!) 
and  bananas.  We  had  a  chippy  hunt  the  night  before, 
the  muchachos  climbing  up  under  the  eaves  of  the 
porch  and  catching  them  in  their  nests.  You  must 
come  to  Manila  if  you  want  a  chippy  breakfast.  It 
seems  we  are  going  to  have  another  hunt  in  a  few 
days.  From  what  I  hear,  this  is  the  chief  exercise  and 
entertainment  of  the  scholastics,  too,  in  vacations. 
Our  Meramec  trips  and  similar  violent  exercises  of  a 
Missouri  vacation  are  eminently  unfitted  for  monks 


112  WILLIAM  STANTON 

who  never  take  off  their  habits  —  though  their  garb 
underneath  would  be  just  the  thing  for  field-day 
sports." 

From  a  letter  to  his  sister,  on  March  12,  1902: 

".  .  .  The  climate  does  not  bother  me  in  the  least. 
It  can't  come  near  Belize  for  heat ;  though  I  have  only 
passed  through  the  coolest  part  of  the  year  and  we  are 
just  approaching  the  worst  part,  April  and  May,  when 
Manila  is  said  to  be  stifling  hot.  But  even  then,  as  I 
see  from  the  figures  given,  the  temperature  and  moist- 
ure does  not  reach  that  of  Belize,  so  I  guess  I  am  safe. 

"  As  for  my  work,  I  may  say  first  that  I  am  finishing 
privately  my  theological  studies  in  preparation  for  the 
priesthood,  and  with  the  Lord's  help  I  hope  to  be 
ordained  some  time  in  June  or  July.  Of  course  you 
will  hear  from  me  before  then,  however.  At  the  same 
time  I  am  one  of  the  assistant  directors  of  the  Observa- 
tory. This  has  the  reputation  throughout  the  world 
of  being  the  best  equipped  meteorological  and  seismical 
observatory  to  be  found  anywhere.  There  are  four 
different  departments,  all  perfectly  equipped ;  the  mag- 
netic, astronomic,  seismic,  and  meteorologic,  the  last 
two  being  the  most  practically  important.  There  are 
six  of  our  Fathers,  besides  myself,  at  the  head  of  the 
different  sections,  and  about  thirty  or  thirty-five  as- 
sistant Filipino  observers  here  at  the  Manila  Observa- 
tory. We  have  some  thirty-two  auxiliary  stations 
scattered  about  the  archipelago,  where  our  observers 
(all  Filipinos  trained  under  our  Fathers  here  at 
Manila)  send  in  their  reports  by  telegraph  several 
times  a  day.     The  principal  work  is  in  the  weather 


MANILA  113 

forecasts  and  predictions  of  the  terrible  typhoons  that 
are  almost  continually  passing  over  some  part  or  other 
of  the  islands  and  the  neighbouring  seas.  The  warn- 
ings are  sent  by  the  Observatory  to  all  points  connected 
by  telegraph  and  cable  in  the  islands  and  neighbouring 
ports  of  Indo-China,  China,  and  Japan.  This  work 
had  been  going  on  for  many  years  before  the  war,  and 
under  the  new  regime  the  U.  S.  Government,  anxious 
to  profit  by  the  admirable  system  and  work  carried  on 
by  our  Fathers,  'has  made  an  arrangement  with  the 
Observatory,  constituting  it  the  official  Philippine 
Weather  Bureau.  We  give  the  Government  the  result 
of  our  scientific  work,  and  it  in  turn  stands  all  the  ex- 
pense of  carrying  on  the  system  and  pays  salaries  to  the 
employees  and  observers  and  directors.  It  is,  however, 
independent  of  the  Civil  Service  Bureau.  Fr.  Algue 
is  the  head  of  the  whole  system,  and  he  is  responsible 
only  to  the  Philippine  Commission. 

".  .  .  Pray  fervently  that  the  Almighty  may  spare  us 
all  till  that  day  when,  though  most  unworthy  of  such  a 
grace,  I  may  be  able,  as  the  Lord's  annointed,  to  lay 
my  consecrated  hands  on  your  heads  and  call  down 
God's  best  blessings  on  all  of  you,  the  nearest  and 
dearest  on  this  earth." 

On  March  31,  he  writes  to  a  class-mate  in  St. 
Louis : 

"...  I  am  glad  you  found  that  letter  interesting, 
bearing  the  postmark  '  Oct.'  and  dated  *  Nov.  Nov. 
Nov.'  I  sent  three  letters  about  the  same  time,  all 
dated  November,  and  realized  the  fact  only  several 
days  afterward;  I  shall  not  attempt  to  explain  the 
discrepancy. 


114  WILLIAM  STANTON 

"  Well,  Lent  and  Holy  Week,  with  its  religious  pro- 
cessions, etc.,  are  all  over.  The  Lent  part  didn't  af- 
fect me,  for  as  I  told  you  before,  we  keep  perpetual 
Lent  here  so  far  as  breakfast  is  concerned.  I  am 
always  as  hungry  as  a  wolf  before  dinner  comes 
around.  I  thought  I  would  get  used  to  the  regime, 
but  I  must  confess  that,  though  it  does  not  interfere 
with  my  work,  I  feel  it  just  as  much  to-day  as  I  did 
the  first  day  of  my  arrival.  No  doubt  it  all  depends  on 
one's  '  raisin' '.  The  processions  through  the  streets 
during  Holy  Week  and  the  devotion  of  the  people  at 
services  were  most  edifying. 

"  To-day  the  professors  at  the  Ateneo  and  the  Nor- 
mal go  out  to  the  villa  at  Sta.  Ana,  to  begin  their  long 
vacations.  Their  supreme  enjoyment  and  recreation 
there  is  playing  dominoes.  .  .  .  The  brother  clothes- 
keeper  has  just  brought  me  my  bathing  suit  for  Sta. 
Ana.  I  think  I  told  you  already  about  the  one  he 
brought  me  for  bathing  in  the  tub  here  at  home. 
With  the  present  thing  on  and  with  the  rope  attach- 
ment around  the  belly,  I  imagine  I  would  make  a  good 
anchor  for  the  raft  at  Beulah.  ...  I  guess  I  shall 
have  to  try  the  experiment,  but  I  don't  anticipate  any 
great  exhilaration  from  the  proceeding,  and  think  a 
couple  of  days  at  the  villa  will  fulfill  all  my  obligations 
of  courtesy.  I  prefer  the  Observatory  grounds  and 
the  shower  bath  here  at  home.  Dominoes  and  ropes 
are  rather  indigestible.  Here  at  home  I  shall  try  to 
prepare  in  my  own  poor  way  for  ordination,  Deo 
volente. 

"  The  exact  day  of  my  ordination  is  not  yet  deter- 
mined. When  it  is  settled,  I  shall  let  you  know  im- 
mediately.    I  begin  to  feel  smaller  and  smaller  as  the 


MANILA  115 

time  draws  near,  but  I  hope  the  Lord  will  not  reject 
me  entirely.  The  American  Catholics  here,  especially 
the  young  men,  are  looking  forward  impatiently  for 
the  day.  They  are  asking  for  me  as  their  director  or 
chaplain.  Great  heavens !  how  small  I  do  feel !  It 
gives  me  the  shivers. 

"  The  English-speaking  dailies  of  Manila  are  still 
continuing  their  crusade  against  the  friars  and  the 
Church.  They  are  getting  ranker  and  ranker  every 
day,  and  there  is  not  a  word  said  in  reply  which  can 
reach  the  ears  of  the  English-speaking  population. 
For  these  latter  never  read  the  Spanish  papers.  It's 
a  great  pity  we  have  no  Catholic  English  organ  here. 
.  .  .  Finally  Superiors  gave  me  a  chance  to  write  some- 
thing. The  difficulty  was  to  get  it  in  the  papers.  I 
sent  it  to  three;  one,  which  had  it  in  for  the  others, 
printed  it.     And  then  there  was  some  fun. 

"  A  comment  of  the  editor  accompanied  the  '  Pro- 
test,' and  this  stirred  up  some  of  the  Irish  blood  of  the 
capital.  A  few  hours  after  the  paper  appeared,  some 
warm-blooded  Celts  bearded  the  editor  in  his  den,  and 
as  one  of  them  expressed  it, '  we  simply  gave  him  hell ! ' 
They  proved  him  to  his  face  a  liar  three  times  over, 
proved  he  didn't  know  a  friar  from  a  corn-cob,  asked 
him  for  some  Catholic  authorities  for  certain  state- 
ments he  had  made.  The  editor  told  them  he  had  a 
Catholic  in  the  office  itself,  who  knew  all  about  the 
friars  and  the  Catholic  Church.  '  Trot  him  out,  and 
let's  see  what  he  looks  like.'  He  ushered  in  a  low- 
browed Portugee  who  said  he  was  a  Catholic  and  had 
lived  eight  years  in  the  house  of  a  friar  with  three 
women.  But  the  Portugee  was  in  for  a  bad  time. 
They  made  him  admit  he  hadn't  been  to  Mass  or  the 


ii6  WILLIAM  STANTON 

Sacraments  in  the  last  eleven  years,  that  his  friar  was 
no  friar  at  all,  but  a  miserable  Filipino  renegade,  that 

he  himself  was  a  d liar  and  libertine,  etc.     They 

wound  up  by  telling  the  editor  again  what  they  thought 
of  him  and  his  Catholic  authorities,  that  they  had  his 
measure  taken  and  his  whole  past  record  and  that  of 
his  gang,  and  that  they  would  show  him  up  and  run 
him  out  of  Manila.  It  was  all  rather  violent,  but 
interesting. 

"  The  chief  spokesman  on  the  occasion  was  a  certain 

O who  had  come  out  as  inspector  of  schools.     He 

is  gathering  a  lot  of  facts  with  regard  to  the  Protest- 
ant propaganda  carried  on  in  the  public  school  system 
here.  As  you  may  have  heard,  four  out  of  five  super- 
intendents here  are  Protestant  ministers.     O is 

finding  out  too  much  here  in  Manila  ...  he  has  been 
assigned  to  the  island  of  Bohol,  where  he  can't  see  any- 
thing or  do  any  damage.  Amongst  all  the  public  school 
teachers  in  Manila  there  is  not  a  single  Catholic  man, 
and  only  two  girls  —  who,  of  course,  don't  count.  The 
Catholic  school  teachers  who  come  from  the  States 
have  been  quietly  shipped  to  the  provinces,  out  in  the 
bush,  where  they  can't  see  what  is  going  on  in  the 
capital,  or  be  an  obstacle  to  the  propagation  of  the 
*  pure  gospel '  of  liberty  with  which  the  grand  Republic 
of  Freedom  is  blessing  the  benighted  Filipino. 

".  .  .  By  the  way,  paulo  majora  canamus.  Fr. 
Algue  has  just  brought  me  in  two  cigars.  They  are 
what  are  called  family  cigars.  Don't  imagine  I  am  try- 
ing to  tell  you  a  fish  story;  these  are  actual  facts. 
Each  cigar  by  actual  measurement  is  two  feet,  one  and 
a  half  inches,  long;  a  little  over  two  inches  in  diameter 
at  the  far  end,  half  an  inch  diameter  at  the  other. 


MANILA  117 

The  modus  operandi  is  as  follows:  The  cigar  is 
strung  up  at  a  convenient  height  in  some  corner  of 
the  house.  The  first  one  up  in  the  morning  lights  the 
big  end  and  puffs  away  until  he  is  tired.  The  other 
members  of  the  family,  or  friends  coming  in,  go  over 
and  take  a  whack  at  it  as  long  as  they  please  whenever 
they  find  it  free.  It  generally  lasts  during  the  whole 
day.  Wouldn't  the  Count  have  a  great  time  working 
out  his  combination  of  strings  and  wires  on  such  a 
subject. 

"  You  have  probably  seen  in  the  papers  before  now 
that  the  cholera  has  broken  out  in  Manila.  No  doubt 
about  it,  and  in  its  most  malignant  form.  The  victims 
drop  off  within  three  or  four  hours  after  being  at- 
tacked. Up  to  the  present  only  one  white  man  has 
been  attacked ;  all  the  others  have  been  natives  or 
Chinese.  Very  stringent  measures  have  been  adopted 
by  the  sanitary  department  and  there  is  good  hope  of 
keeping  it  in  check.  Several  of  the  infected  districts 
have  been  burnt  to  the  ground ;  the  whole  city  is  under 
strict  quarantine.  Nevertheless  it  has  already  spread 
to  Cavite,  Balanga,  and  Malolos.  The  authorities  have 
stamped  out  the  bubonic  plague,  and  we  hope  the  same 
will  be  done  with  the  present  pest,  which  came  from 
some  one  of  the  Chinese  ports;  yet  it  will  be  a  more 
difficult  matter. 

"  I  hope  I  shall  be  ordained  about  the  same  time  as 
you  in  St.  Louis.  I  am  sorry  I  am  missing  the  Rites 
Class  and  other  good  helps  of  the  theologate.  There 
will  probably  be  some  brown-skinned  Filipinos  or- 
dained with  me,  so  I  shall  feel  right  at  home  so  far 
as  colour  is  concerned.  Don't  forget  the  old  Carib  in 
your  prayers." 


ii8  WILLIAM  STANTON 

June  15,  1902. 

".  .  .  Nearly  every  letter  I  have  had  in  the  last  six 
months  asks  about  the  date  of  my  ordination.  Well, 
at  the  present  date,  June  15, 1  haven't  the  slightest  idea  ! 
I  had  been  looking  forward  to  this  event  taking  place 
toward  the  end  of  this  month,  at  least  about  the  same 
date  as  that  of  my  companeros  in  St.  Louis,  but  now  I 
guess  not.  Superiors  here  must  wait  for  the  word 
from  the  Prov.  at  St.  Louis,  and  so  far  that  word  is 
not  forthcoming.  You  see,  I  am  in  the  far,  far  East, 
on  the  other  side  of  the  world.  I  still  have  hopes 
something  may  turn  up  before  St.  Ignatius'  day  — 
vamos  a  ver !  Or  perhaps  after  the  informations  have 
come  in  about  Buck  Stanton's  career  during  the  last 
fifteen  years,  from  north,  south,  east  and  west,  su- 
periors may  judge  here  that  he  needs  to  brush  up  his 
spiritual  furniture  for  a  year  or  two  longer,  and  to 
get  over  his  inveterate  worldly  habits,  such  as  sitting 
with  his  legs  crossed  and  combing  his  hair.  But  no 
doubt  the  Lord  will  bring  things  around  in  their  proper 
time,  and  no  need  to  worry. 

"  (Monday  morning,  9:30)  — Ca  .  .  .  nastos!  have 
just  shot  a  '  lectio  brevis '  at  my  little  brown  brothers. 
We  never  know  what's  ahead  of  us.  When  I  stepped 
out  of  my  last  class  in  Belize  I  thought  my  magisterium 
was  over  for  good  and  aye.  But  lo!  here  I  am  pro- 
fessor of  English  in  the  higher  classes  of  the  famous 
Escuela  Normal  de  S.  Xavier  de  Manila.  My  present 
disciples  are  somewhat  older  than  my  charges  at 
Belize,  but  run  pretty  much  through  the  same  range 
of  colours,  barring  however  both  white  and  black. 
Of  course  my  opening  speech  was  entirely  in  Spanish, 
as   my   future   Aguinaldos   are   scarcely  yet  able   to 


MANILA  119 

wrestle  with  English  as  she  is  spoke.  But  in  a  couple 
of  months  I  hope  we  shall  be  able  to  dispense  with 
most  of  the  Spanish,  for  they  are  ravenous  for  English. 

"  We  have  about  two  thousand  boys  at  the  two 
schools  here,  nearly  six  hundred  of  them  boarders. 
Our  Fathers  say  that  if  we  had  room  and  men,  we 
should  easily  get  between  three  and  four  thousand 
pupils.  It  is  wonderful  what  confidence  the  Filipino 
has  in  Jesuit  teaching :  the  tradition  goes  down  through 
generations.  As  soon  as  the  boys  of  the  family  begin 
to  wear  trousers  (ten  years  or  thereabouts),  they  are 
shipped  off  to  the  Padres  de  la  Compania,  los  Jesuitas, 
and  generally  they  go  right  through  the  course.  If 
some  of  them  have  cabbage  heads,  the  parent  says: 
*  Well,  never  mind ;  they  must  go  to  the  Fathers  just  the 
same.  They  will  make  good  civilized  Christians  out  of 
them  and  gentlemen,  and  that  is  the  most  important 
thing  for  this  world  and  the  next.'  This  is  quoted  al- 
most literally  from  a  letter  received  yesterday  by  the 
Rector  from  a  man  who  now  has  three  sons  here. 
Nine  boys  of  the  same  family  have  already  gone 
through  our  colleges,  and  the  father  writes  that  he  has 
three  smaller  ones  at  home  whom  he  will  send,  '  with 
God's  help,'  as  soon  as  they  are  old  enough!  (They 
are  good  Catholic  families  here:  like  the  Irish;  twelve 
to  fifteen  children  are  common.) 

"  Up  to  a  month  ago  all  our  '  American  '  newspapers 
of  Manila  were  rabidly  anti-Catholic,  anti-friar,  anti- 
Filipino,  anti-Spanish,  anti-all-morals.  The  two  prin- 
cipal dailies  are  fairly  well  run  down.  The  editors  of 
two  others  were  brought  up  and  convicted  of  '  sedi- 
tion.' A  third  has  sold  out  and  is  now  in  other  hands. 
It  looks  as  if  we  were  finally  to  have  a  couple  of  decent 


I20  WILLIAM  STANTON 

daily  papers.  A  new  clean  little  weekly  has  lately 
shown  up,  of  which  I  am  sending  a  few  copies.  From 
these  you  will  see  that  the  tide  is  beginning  to  turn. 

"  I  get  '  the  most  widely  read  newspaper  in  Central 
America '  regularly  from  Stanley,  and  an  occasional 
letter  from  Bro.  Dan,  so  that  I  keep  in  touch  with 
Belize.  I  am  sorry  to  hear  that  there  is  danger  of 
the  college  going  by  the  board.  But  my  Mayas  and 
Caribs  will  always  be  on  deck,  and  I  hope  to  be  ready 
for  them  in  a  short  time.  .  .  .  What  has  become  of  my 
famous  invincible  *  Columbian  Crew  '  ?  Oh,  for  a  good 
pull  at  the  oars  or  a  dive  into  Hmpid  waters!  But 
alas !  we  don't  engage  in  such  worldly  pastimes  here. 
Do  you  remember  our  five  mile  pull  from  the  '  Haul- 
over  '  against  Willie  Price  and  Stolf  ?  and  our  row  out 
to  Spanish  Caye  on  New  Year's  eve?  How  I  wish 
you  were  here  for  a  day,  so  that  we  might  slip  off  to 
the  woods  and  get  lost,  as  we  did  that  day  back  of 
Stann  Creek  with  Magdaleno  for  our  guide !  " 

In  a  sense,  these  letters  need  no  interpretation. 
Scattered  through  nearly  a  year,  they  indicate 
roughly  the  wide  variety  of  his  occupations.  Yet 
one  would  scarcely  gather  from  them  how  intensely 
active  Stanton  was  during  that  time.  Witk  charac- 
teristic modesty  he  says  nothing  at  all  of  his  de- 
cidedly striking  achievements  in  the  field  of  science. 
It  is  almost  incredible  to  find  from  the  records  of 
the  Smithsonian  Institution  at  Washington  that,  in 
the  midst  of  a  lot  of  other  work,  he  discovered  sixty- 


MANILA  121 

seven  new  varieties  of  hymenopterous  insects,  of 
which  one  genus  and  eight  species  have  been  named 
after  him.  That  would  be  rather  a  proud  record 
for  a  man  who  could  devote  uninterrupted  years  to 
the  sole  work  of  collecting  and  investigating.  He 
wrote  monographs  on  "  Insects  Affecting  the  Crops 
in  the  Philippines,"  in  connection  with  his  "  Crop 
Service."  He  made  interesting  and  valuable  re- 
searches in  botany.  With  all  this,  and  with  a  great 
deal  of  routine  work  in  the  observatory,  he  had  a 
large  task  of  smoothing,  rather  unofficially,  the  re- 
lations between  the  Government  executives  and  the 
Fathers  in  charge  of  the  Observatory.  And  he  still 
found  time  for  a  multitudinous  correspondence,  of 
which  the  few  extracts  just  quoted  can  give  but  the 
most  meagre  idea. 

It  would  almost  be  worth  while  printing  that  cor- 
respondence in  full,  to  have  it  show  how  completely 
self-effacing  Stanton  was,  and  to  show  how  the  pur- 
pose and  hope  of  working  for  others  dominated  him. 
If  his  work  was  in  science,  his  dreams  were  all  of 
souls.  To  study  "  bugs  "  amused  him :  to  do  good 
to  his  fellow-men  was  his  supreme  inspiration.  But 
I  have  no  intention  of  treating  this  period  of  his  life 
fully.  It  will  suffice  for  my  purpose  to  have  given 
a  sufficient  outline  of  it  to  fill  in  the  general  view. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

On  August  10,  1902,  Stanton  was  ordained  priest, 
in  the  private  chapel  of  the  Archbishop  of  Manila. 
He  was  in  his  thirty- third  year,  and  had  been  fifteen 
years  in  the  Society.  How  the  expectation  of  that 
day  had  coloured  all  his  thoughts  through  those 
years!  His  letter  to  his  sister,  written  on  the  day 
after  his  first  Mass,  is  inexpressibly  touching  in  its 
simple  feeling;  but  it  is  too  sacred  for  public  perusal. 
He  was  awed,  but  not  frightened.  The  faith  that 
made  him  wonder  at  God's  astonishing  condescen- 
sion, gave  him  courage  to  accept  the  great  gift  and 
the  great  responsibility  with  perfect  simplicity. 
The  whole  affair  was  too  big  to  prose  about  it.  It 
was  all  God's  doing,  and  he  could  only  be  quietly 
grateful  that  God  had  picked  him  out,  a  little  pawn, 
for  such  a  move  in  the  Great  Game. 

His  ordination  was  very  quiet,  without  any  public 
display.  The  little  regret  that  none  of  his  family 
could  be  present  was  swallowed  up  in  the  immensity 
of  the  fact  that  he  was  now  "  a  priest  forever." 
His  mind  leaped  out  at  once  to  his  new  duties,  his 

122 


THE  PRIEST  123 

new,  wonderful  opportunities.  It  was  a  consum- 
mation, the  crown  of  years  of  efforts :  but  not  a  time 
for  "  Nunc  Dimitis,"  rather  for  the  cry  of  the  heart, 
"  Here  am  I,  send  me !  "  It  was  for  this  that  he  had 
become  a  Jesuit,  for  this  that  he  had  made  sacrifices : 
to  work  for  others,  to  be  God's  minister  to  needy 
men. 

And  very  swiftly  God  sent  him  to  His  work. 
There  was  a  little  breathing-spell,  a  little  delay  for 
human  congratulations.  There  was  a  great  Solemn 
Mass  at  La  Ermita,  "  the  American  church  " ;  with 
the  Army  Chaplains  as  his  assistants ;  before  a  great 
crowd  of  notables,  American  and  Filipino ;  with  the 
music  of  a  full  orchestra  of  eighty  pieces,  and  ex- 
quisite singing.  There  were  receptions  in  his 
honour,  and  no  end  of  gifts,  testimonials,  addresses, 
what-not.  The  Manila  papers  flared  — "  The  first 
American  priest  ordained  in  Manila  " — "  A  new  era 
for  Catholicity  in  the  Philippines !  "  and  so  forth. 
But  in  a  few  days  he  was  back  at  his  post  at  the 
Observatory,  with  the  new  tasks,  the  most  satisfy- 
ing tasks,  of  a  priest. 

The  cholera  still  raged.  Fr.  McKinnon,  the  resi- 
dent Army  Chaplain  in  Manila,  sickened  and  died, 
Fr.  Stanton's  work  multiplied.     He  gives  some  de- 


124  WILLIAM  STANTON 

tails  in  the  course  of  a  letter  to  a  comrade  in  St. 
Louis. 

".  .  .  With  the  death  of  Fr.  McKinnon,  I  was  left 
the  only  English-speaking  priest  in  Manila.  The  day 
he  fell  sick,  just  during  the  height  of  the  cholera,  I  was 
hurried  out  on  an  emergency  call  to  a  poor  Kentucky 
negro  dying  of  the  pest.  I  got  there  in  time  to  confess 
him  and  give  him  the  last  anointing  before  he  died. 
You  see,  I  seem  fated  for  the  niggers,  or  at  least  for 
the  coloured  folk  of  one  kind  or  another.  The  follow- 
ing night  I  was  called  again,  at  2:30  a.m.,  this  time 
for  two  poor  Irish  teamsters  in  the  same  fix  as  the 
nigger,  and  with  the  help  of  the  Lord  I  got  them  ready 
for  the  next  world.  After  that  work  came  swiftly 
indeed. 

"  Sunday  came,  and  I  had  to  take  Fr.  McKinnon's 
place  and  look  after  the  American  congregation  in 
Ermita  church,  with  mass  and  sermon  at  9 130.  I  know 
it  is  contrary  to  all  the  books  and  the  counsels  of  the 
elders  for  a  young,  inexperienced  priest  to  get  up  and 
attempt  to  preach  the  word  of  God  without  very  careful 
preparation,  even  in  writing,  but  with  my  Observatory 
work  and  my  class  and  my  sick  I  was  glad  enough  to 
have  time  even  to  read  over  the  Gospel  of  the  day 
before  Mass  on  the  morning  itself :  writing  was  hope- 
lessly out  of  the  question.  When  cholera  is  abroad, 
taking  off  poor  fellows  with  three  or  four  hours' 
notice,  and  you  find  yourself  the  only  pebble  on  the 
beach,  all  things  cannot  be  done  according  to  the  books. 

"  After  the  cholera  had  almost  completely  disap- 
peared amongst  the  civilian  whites,  it  broke  out 
amongst  the  soldiers,  and  had  carried  off  sixteen  of 


THE  PRIEST  125 

the  poor  boys  in  the  pest  hospital  before  I  knew  any- 
thing about  it.  The  worst  of  it  was  that  I  found  about 
two-thirds  of  the  names  were  Irish.  I  hurried  down 
immediately,  and  found  twenty-seven  boys,  seventeen 
of  whom  were  Catholics.  I  got  confessions  from 
every  one  of  them  and,  with  one  exception,  without 
any  difficulty.  This  exception  was  a  strawberry  blonde 
like  Your  Reverence,  and  answered  to  the  euphonious 
name  of  Kennedy.  He  told  me  he  was  not  a  Catholic 
and  that  I  could  not  do  anything  for  him.  I  asked 
him  where  he  had  stolen  his  name.  Within  ten  min- 
utes I  had  him  on  his  knees  —  metaphorically,  to  be 
sure  —  and  before  I  left  him  he  too  had  made  his  peace 
with  his  Maker  and  was  ready  to  appear  before  the 
Source  of  all  mercy. 

"  My  hospital  work,  though  not  specially  exhilarat- 
ing physically  after  a  full  day's  work  in  the  Observa- 
tory, I  found  truly  most  consoling.  The  looks  with 
which  I  am  greeted  on  my  first  appearance  at  any  of 
the  American  hospitals  are  anything  but  encouraging ; 
for  with  my  cassock  I  am,  of  course,  invariably  taken 

as  one  of  those  d friars.     But  I  no  sooner  make 

myself  known  than  I  am  treated  with  the  greatest  con- 
sideration by  officials,  nurses,  and  men,  and  am  given 
a  free  fling. 

"  When  the  cholera  subsided  in  the  city  I  began  to 
round  up  some  of  the  soldier  boys  in  their  quarters. 
One  instance  may  be  interesting.  Mr.  Brown,  the 
English  scholastic  recently  arrived,  and  myself  started 
for  a  walk  in  the  outskirts  of  Manila,  looking  for  some- 
thing to  turn  up.  We  missed  our  way,  and  found  our- 
selves at  nightfall  in  sight  of  a  village  of  natives  about 
four  miles  from  the  city.     The  streets  were  alive  with 


126  WILLIAM  STANTON 

thousands  of  natives  who  seemed  to  speak  nothing 
but  Tagalo  and  were  wondering  what  the  two  '  f  railes  ' 
were  after.  I  managed,  however,  after  a  httle  search, 
to  hit  the  right  road  to  Manila,  and  found  it  led  to 
just  what  I  was  looking  for,  the  Pasay  Barracks.  It 
was  late,  and  we  had  no  time  to  lose.  As  we  were 
hurrying  along  in  the  moonlit  road  near  the  quarters, 
I  overheard  the  remark  from  a  group  in  a  roadside 
tienda,  '  What-in-the-hell  kind  of  friars  are  those, 
talking  English  ? '  Just  then  two  of  the  boys  turned 
suddenly  in  their  tracks,  started  down  the  road  ahead 
of  us,  and  waited  in  the  shadow  of  a  clump  of  bamboo. 
As  we  neared  them,  they  came  out  into  the  moonlight, 
doited  their  hats,  and  one  of  them  blurted  out: 
'  Father,  we  heard  you  speaking  English.  You're  the 
first  priest  we  have  heard  speak  English  since  we  have 
been  out  here,  and  we'd  like  very  much  if  you  could 
arrange  to  give  a  lot  of  us  boys  a  chance  to  go  to  our 
duties.' 

"  I  told  them  they  were  just  the  chaps  I  was  looking 
for.  I  learned  from  them  that  in  their  battery,  out  of 
a  hundred  and  four  men  who  came  out  from  the  States, 
one  hundred  were  Catholics.  They  came  from  New 
York,  and  my  two  friends  answered  to  the  names,  Tom 
Burke  and  Bill  Madden.  I  told  them  I  would  try  to 
make  arrangements  for  next  Sunday,  and  sent  them 
away  happy,  to  drum  up  their  companions. 

"  The  Post  comprises  three  batteries  of  artillery  and 
seven  cavalry  companies.  During  the  week  I  called 
on  the  Commandant,  told  him  who  I  was  and  what  I 
wanted.  He  was  not  a  Catholic,  and  there  was  a 
Protestant  Chaplain  at  the  Post,  and  the  Post  had  in 
the  meantime  been  quarantined;  but  notwithstanding 


THE  PRIEST  127 

these  facts,  he  told  me  with  the  greatest  courtesy  that 
he  would  issue  a  general  order  on  Saturday  morning, 
advising  all  the  men  that  those  who  wished  to  attend 
my  '  service  '  might  take  out  passes  for  Saturday  eve- 
ning (3  to  6  o'clock)  and  Sunday  morning  (8  to  11 
o'clock).  He  wished  the  boys  had  a  chance  oftener  to 
have  the  services  of  an  American  Catholic  priest. 

"  For  the  edification  of  the  natives,  I  preferred  to  use 
the  church  of  the  town  a  mile  or  so  distant,  rather  than 
say  Mass  in  the  Post;  for  the  Filipino  looks  on  all 
Americanos  as  heathens  —  and  you  can't  blame  them 
much,  either.  Saturday  afternoon,  a  band  of  about 
fifty  of  the  boys  marched  to  the  church  under  the  com- 
mand of  Sergeant  O'Donnell.  The  gallant  Sergeant 
said  that  he  had  rounded  up  the  present  crowd,  and 
that  more  would  come  later,  but  that  he  could  not  go 
to  confession  himself  to-day,  as  it  had  been  seven  years 
since  he  had  been  to  his  duties,  and  he  was  not  ready, 
Father,  and  he  would  go  some  other  time,  Father,  etc. 
etc.  '  No,  no,  old  man ;  that  won't  do  at  all.  You 
must  give  the  example  to  your  men.'  And  in  the  end 
I  just  took  him  quietly  by  the  arm,  and  we  marched 
into  the  church  and  to  the  confessional.  The  others 
say  he  came  out  radiant,  and  persuaded  quite  a  num- 
ber of  them,  who  had  simply  taken  out  passes  to  get 
out  of  quarantine  and  who  were  in  the  same  fix  as  he, 
to  clean  up  their  scores.  Before  they  left  every  last 
one  had  been  to  confession,  and  you  never  saw  a  hap- 
pier set  of  boys  as  they  marched  back  to  barracks. 

"  In  the  morning  before  Mass  I  heard  some  more 
confessions.  Then,  when  the  church  was  cleared  of 
natives  after  their  last  Mass,  about  9:30,  I  celebrated 
for  my  soldier  boys.     The  doors,  windows,  and  rear 


128  WILLIAM  STANTON 

portion  of  the  church  were  crowded  with  astonished 
natives,  taking  in  the  unusual  sight.  There  are  no 
pews  in  these  churches,  you  know,  and  the  body  of  uni- 
formed Americans  kneeling  on  the  floor  during  nearly 
the  whole  Mass  was  a  revelation  to  the  Filipinos,  who, 
except  at  the  consecration,  stand  during  Mass,  the 
women  squatting  on  the  floor,  the  babies  rolling  around 
indiscriminately  from  one  place  to  another.  Their 
wonder  grew  when  they  saw  our  boys  walk  up  to  the 
communion  rail  with  hands  folded  and  eyes  cast  down 
in  all  reverence,  as  we  are  accustomed  to  do  at  home ; 
whereas  here  the  men,  when  they  do  go  (a  rare  oc- 
currence, so  far  as  my  experience  goes),  approach  and 
return  from  the  rail  nonchalantly,  very  much  as  men 
walk  about  the  public  streets  of  our  cities.  But  our 
standards  of  reverence  in  many  ways  seem  to  be  dif- 
ferent. 

"  Another  hit  seems  to  have  been  made  by  my  aco- 
lytes, the  redoubtable  Sergeant  O'Donnell  and  Cor- 
poral Kelly,  who  served  the  Mass  in  full  uniform  and 
went  through  their  parts  like  professed  members  of 
the  Holy  Family  Altar  Boys  Society.  The  native 
Padre  was  himself  very  much  impressed  by  the  con- 
duct of  the  boys,  and  took  occasion  from  their  example 
to  preach  a  lesson  to  his  own  people.  During  the 
Mass  I  gave  them  a  few  words  '  appropriate  to  the 
occasion,'  and  after  Mass  sent  them  back  light-hearted 
to  their  barracks  with  the  promise  of  another  chance 
to  clean  up  their  books  before  a  great  while.  .  .  . 

"  Excuse  the  interruption.  I  expected  to  give  you 
an  account  of  a  couple  of  my  trips  through  the  prov- 
inces, but  I  find  I  have  no  time.     In  a  few  minutes  I 


THE  PRIEST  129 

shall  have  to  be  packing  my  grip  for  an  inspection  of 
the  meteorological  stations  in  the  Sulu  archipelago, 
Jolo,  Mindanao,  and  other  southern  islands.  I  start 
to-morrow  on  the  '  Hai-Mun.'  So,  hasta  luego,  old 
fellow." 

His  work  as  a  priest  in  Manila  was  really  con- 
siderable. In  addition  to  acting  as  a  sort  of  unoffi- 
cial chaplain  to  the  soldiers,  he  kept  on  in  charge  of 
the  Ermita  church  and  so  was  thrown  into  contact 
with  the  fairly  large  body  of  American  Catholics  in 
the  city.  And  with  all  he  made  himself  felt  almost 
immediately.  The  "  boys  "  delighted  in  him,  wel- 
comed him  at  once  with  the  utmost  goodfellowship 
and  with  complete  confidence.  More  than  one 
Army  officer  has  testified  to  the  immense  influence 
he  had  over  them.  It  is  safe  to  say  that  during 
his  time  there  were  very  few  Catholic  soldiers  in 
Manila  who  did  not  practise  their  religion  edify- 
ingly.  He  was  all  priest,  but  he  had  no  clerical 
pose ;  nor,  on  the  other  hand,  had  he  any  cheap  tricks 
of  an  affected  camaraderie.  With  a  quiet,  natural 
dignity,  with  perfect  good-humour,  and  with  the 
absolute  simple  sincerity  which  was  native  to  him, 
he  came  amongst  them  as  God's  representative  and 
they  received  him  as  such.  He  could  chaff  them 
without  sacrificing  at  all  his  priestly  character ;  and 


I30  WILLIAM  STANTON 

he  could  talk  very  bluntly  to  them  without  being 
even  suspected  of  scolding. 

Nor  was  his  influence  less  in  the  wider  field  of  the 
civilians.  How  he  met  all  the  demands  on  his  time 
from  these,  in  the  midst  of  his  other  occupations,  is 
matter  for  wonder.  It  is  not  astonishing  that  we 
have  fewer  letters  of  this  period ;  the  marvel  being 
rather  that  he  should  find  time  to  write  any.  He 
was,  in  a  short  time,  one  of  the  best-known  men  in 
Manila,  as  much  respected  and  loved  amongst  the 
official  and  educated  classes  as  amongst  his  "  boys  " 
at  the  barracks.  And  withal  he  found  time  to  look 
after  the  needs  of  some  of  the  Filipino  people. 
There  was  an  American  Normal  School  in  Manila, 
established  by  the  Government  for  Filipino  girls. 
These  girls,  living  in  a  dormitory  under  charge  of  an 
excellent  American  woman,  a  Protestant,  were  very 
keen  to  be  Americanized.  They  asked  Fr.  Stanton 
if  they  might  go  to  a  Protestant  church,  as  they 
wished  to  have  their  religious  instruction  in  English. 
With  no  little  difficulty,  he  arranged  to  give  them 
instruction  and  catechism  classes  himself :  the  Gov- 
ernor General,  himself  a  Catholic,  insisting  that  each 
Catholic  girl  should  secure  a  written  request  for 
such  instruction  from  her  parents.  The  work  still 
continues. 


THE  PRIEST  131 

Then,  he  had  to  go  on  long  tours  of  inspection 
through  the  Islands,  in  his  meteorological  work. 
And  here  too  he  is  always  the  priest.  Whatever 
time  he  could  properly  spare  from  his  scientific  duties 
was  given  to  helping  the  natives,  who  in  many  in- 
stances were  sorely  in  need  of  help.  Almost  any 
letter  on  these  tours,  taken  at  random,  will  show 
how  eager  and  how  successful  was  his  activity.  As 
an  instance,  he  writes  to  his  aunt,  on  February  20, 
1903: 

"  Zamboanga,  Mindanao,  P.  I. 

"...  I  just  arrived  yesterday  from  the  island  of 
Jolo  in  the  Sulu  Archipelago.  This  is  the  stronghold 
of  the  Moros  in  these  parts  and  the  residence  of  the 
Sultan.  But  in  the  town  there  are,  besides  the  Ameri- 
can soldiers,  a  few  hundred  Christian  Filipinos. 
There  is  no  priest,  so  I  was  kept  busy  baptizing  babies 
born  since  the  last  time  they  had  seen  a  priest,  which 
was  nearly  a  year  ago.  These  poor  people  kept  me 
occupied  up  to  the  very  moment  I  had  to  board  the 
steamer  for  Zamboanga.  Jolo  is  about  five  degrees 
north  of  the  equator,  almost  in  sight  of  Borneo,  and 
some  eight  hundred  miles  from  Manila. 

"  Zamboanga,  where  I  am  now,  is  a  beautiful,  well- 
shaded  town,  full  of  coconut  groves  and  lovely  trees, 
and  is  the  military  headquarters  for  the  southern 
islands.  Saturday  and  Sunday  I  shall  give  the  soldiers 
a  chance  to  go  to  their  religious  duties.  The  poor 
fellows  are  here,  some  of  them  for  years,  without  hav- 


132  WILLIAM  STANTON 

ing  had  a  chance  to  speak  to  a  priest  who  could  under- 
stand them. 

"  To-morrow  morning  I  go  to  the  island  of  Basilan, 
another  island  of  Moros,  where  there  are  some  troops, 
and  where  I  shall  have  some  scientific  work  and  also 
some  work  for  souls.  .  .  ." 

In  the  meanwhile,  the  work  at  the  Observatory 
increased,  owing  to  the  absence  of  some  of  the  direc- 
tors. Then  Fr.  Stanton  was  appointed  confessor  to 
the  boys  at  the  Normal  School.  He  welcomed  a 
week's  rest  at  the  villa,  and  took  advantage  of  the 
respite  to  go  out  and  capture  a  live  boa-constrictor. 
He  writes  to  St.  Louis : 

"  Manila  Observatory,  June  23,  1903. 

"  Salutations  from  the  Pearl  of  the  Orient  to  all  the 
crowd !  A  short  time  ago  I  spent  a  week's  vacation  at 
Santa  Ana,  where  I  passed  the  time  pleasantly,  burning 
Manila  weeds  and  diving  under  dead  carabaos  and  cer- 
tain other  smaller  but  no  less  interesting  floaters  in 
the  simmering  waters  of  the  tortuous  Pasig.  The  river 
hereabouts  would  in  some  respects  run  a  close  second 
to  the  Chicago  River,  though  it  is  infinitely  more  pic- 
turesque. But  at  present  I  am  head  and  heels  in  work, 
since  the  stafif  has  been  reduced  by  the  departure  of  the 
two  that  have  sailed  for  the  States.  .  .  . 

",  .  .  Enclosed  you  will  find  a  paragraph  from  the 
Manila  Cahlenews,  which  you  may  find  interesting  and 
which  will  remind  you  of  days  gone  by.  I  have  the 
beast  in  training  and  have  just  regaled  him  with  a 


THE  PRIEST  133 

morsel  of  one  rat  and  two  cats  —  alive,  of  course.  He 
slid  them  down  nicely  and  asked  for  more.  He  is  a 
bit  too  strenuous  for  one  man  to  handle,  and  not  over- 
affectionate  as  yet ;  for  the  other  day,  when  an  hombre 
and  myself  were  giving  him  some  exercise,  the  hombre 
grabbed  the  beast's  tail  before  I  was  aware  of  it,  and 
the  beast  himself  managed  to  comb  the  back  of  rny 
left  hand  with  his  upper  jaw.  The  by-standers  were 
horrified,  of  course,  to  see  the  blood  running,  but  I  am 
still  alive  and  kicking. 

"Exceptionally  hot  weather  just  now  —  rainy  sea- 
son a  month  late,  and  not  in  sight  yet.  Both  colleges 
larger  than  last  year.  For  want  of  accomodations  we 
had  to  refuse  more  than  two  hundred  applications  as 
boarders  at  the  Normal,  and  more  than  three  hundred 
at  the  Ateneo.  It  was  rather  amusing  to  hear  the 
parents  say,  when  told  that  there  was  not  a  single  bed 
vacant :  '  Oh,  that  is  nothing,  Father.  Let  the  boys 
sleep  anywhere,  on  the  floor,  in  the  kitchen,  with  the 
cats  and  chickens ;  they  sleep  anywhere ;  only  please 
take  them  in ;  they  have  never  slept  on  a  bed  in  their 
lives ! ' 

".  .  .  We  have  just  heard  of  the  appointment  of 
Fr.  Harty  as  Archbishop  of  Manila.  Would  to  God 
he  may  come  soon,  to  begin  to  put  some  order  in  the 
chaos  now  reigning.  But  if  he  is  not  an  extraordinary 
man,  he  will  either  give  up  in  disgust  or  be  put  in  an 
insane  asylum  before  he  lives  here  long  and  tries  to 
do  his  duty.^     I  pity  the  poor  man  who  comes." 

1  Archbishop  Harty  did  not  give  up  in  disgust,  did  not  re- 
tire to  an  asylum,  but  remained  thirteen  years  and  did  his 
duty.  I  think  Fr.  Stanton  would  have  been  particularly  glad 
to  let  this  sentence  stand,  and  with  it  the  historic  conclusion 


134  WILLIAM  STANTON 

It  was  all  good  work,  and  it  was  very  interesting 
work;  though  of  course,  like  all  work,  it  had  its 
monotonous  side  too.  Yet  there  is  an  exultation 
about  the  work  of  a  priest  that  perhaps  no  other 
work  in  the  world  has.  He  wields  a  tremendous 
power,  the  power  indeed  of  God,  his  Master:  and 
at  times  he  is  jolted  out  of  the  rut  of  whatever 
monotony  may  lay  hold  upon  him,  by  the  astounding 
effects  of  that  power.  Many  a  young  priest  loses 
his  head  temporarily  in  the  beginning  of  his 
ministry,  and  is  poured  out  like  water;  he  makes 
us  think  of  the  disciples  who  came  back  to  our  Lord 
after  their  first  mission,  all  excited,  crying  out, 
"  Lord,  in  thy  name  we  have  cast  out  devils,  and 
healed  the  sick !  " —  and  of  the  quiet  rebuke  that 
Jesus  gave  them.  Well,  it  is  a  pardonable  fault, 
if  it  do  not  become  permanent. 

Fr.  Stanton  too  felt  the  thrill  of  his  priestly  work, 
and  exulted  in  the  success  that  God  gave  to  such 
efforts  as  he  could  put  forth;  but  it  did  not  go  to 
his  head.  He  had,  of  course,  the  almost  extremely 
conservative  tradition  of  the  Society  back  of  him,  to 
steady  him.  His  was  an  anomalous  position  for  a 
Jesuit,  to  be  thrust  at  once  after  ordination  into  the 

that  Archbishop  Harty  was  an  extraordinary  man.  But  his 
extraordinariness  is  quite  the  ordinary  in  a  Church  which 
shirks  no  duty. 


THE  PRIEST  135 

full  tide  of  a  priest's  activity;  and  his  letters  make 
it  clear  that  he  discounted  the  fact  cannily  enough. 
He  knew  that  ordinarily,  before  his  real  work  as  a 
priest  would  begin,  he  should  have  a  very  important 
special  year  of  training  to  go  through,  which  would 
induct  him  gradually  into  his  new  duties  and  do 
about  as  much  as  is  humanly  possible  to  preclude 
gaucheries  and  mistakes  in  their  fulfilment.  It  was 
impossible,  obviously,  for  him  to  enter  just  then 
upon  that  training.  But  it  was  only  deferred,  not 
omitted.  The  Society  properly  sets  great  store  by 
what  it  calls  its  "  third  year  of  probation." 

Fr.  Stanton  expected  to  leave  Manila  for  his 
"  third  year  "  in  the  summer  following  his  ordina- 
tion. However,  when  this  time  came,  the  reduced 
condition  of  the  staff  at  the  Observatory  necessi- 
tated another  postponement.  He  was  rather  disap- 
pointed ;  not  that  he  had  any  wild  longing  for  a  year 
of  seclusion;  but  because  it  had  to  be  gone  through 
some  time,  and  he  wished  to  have  it  over  —  he  was 
a  normal,  human  man.  But  he  did  have  a  very  sen- 
sible appreciation  of  the  value  of  the  "  third  year  " : 
an  appreciation  which  its  difficulties  would,  for  him, 
not  at  all  dim.  There  is  a  good  deal  of  banter,  but 
a  good  deal  of  earnestness  too,  in  his  writing  to  a 
class-mate  doing  his  "  third  year  "  at  the  time : 


136  WILLIAM  STANTON 

"  November  10,  1903. 

".  .  .  How  I  envy  all  you  fellows  the  placid,  ethe- 
rialized  atmosphere  of  the  holy  '  house  of  bread,' 
whilst  here  I  am,  the  same  old  Buck,  after  fourteen 
years  of  knocking  about  in  all  four  quarters  of  the 
civilized  and  uncivilized  globe,  still  engaged  head  and 
heels  in  such  vulgar,  mundane  occupations  as  signing 
cheques  for  filthy  lucre,  pounding  away  at  a  typewriter, 
and  messing  about  amongst  a  lot  of  bugs!  I  hope  it 
is  not  presuming  to  ask  you  to  remind  all  the  old  fel- 
lows of  our  class,  who  in  company  with  you  are  now 
regaling  themselves  in  the  rich  pastures  near  the 
verdant  summits  of  the  mountains  of  asceticism,  to 
breathe  a  silent  prayer  for  the  conversion  of  a  poor, 
dull  mortal  grovelling  down  here  in  the  dark  valleys 
below. 

"  How  angelic  must  be  the  olive-tinted  countenance 

of  little  B ,  under  the  sanctifying  influence  of  dear 

old    Florissant!     And   modest   little   T with   his 

sidelong  hop  and  dove-like  demeanor,  what  a  model 
the  holy  novices  have  before  their  eyes !  And  what 
samples  of  exquisite  gravity  they  have  before  them, 

as    Long  John   and   Tommy   W shoulder   their 

brooms  in  '  manualia '  or  glide  over  the  refectory  floor 
with  a  trayful  of  dishes !  "  .  .  . 

And  so  the  letter  goes  on,  full  of  chafing ;  yet  of 
something  deeper  than  any  chaffing :  a  man's  way  of 
saying  a  serious  thing  without  blaring  it. 

It  was  settled  that,  when  he  should  go  to  his 
"  third  year,"  he  was  to  go  to  Spain,  in  order  that 
he  might  incidentally  perfect  himself  in  his  know!- 


THE  PRIEST  137 

edge  of  Spanish.  He  mentions  this  repeatedly. 
But  he  was  not  thinking  of  Spanish  for  the  PhiHp- 
pines,  but  for  his  old  mission  in  Central  America. 
Towards  the  end  of  1903,  he  writes  to  his  successor 
in  Belize,  now  at  his  theology  in  St.  Louis,  urging 
him  to  propose  coming  with  him  to  Spain. 

".  .  .  It  is  the  only  way  to  learn  to  speak  the  lan- 
guage. Then  we  would  be  ready  to  sail  together  for 
the  land  of  the  mahogany.  I  think  we  should  make  a 
good  pulling  team  for  the  backwoods  of  the  Cayo.  Of 
course  I  had  expected  to  beat  you  back  there  by  several 
years  at  least,  but  *  man  proposes  and  God  disposes.' " 

British  Honduras  was  still  in  his  heart.  The 
program  was,  Spain  for  the  "  third  year,"  then  back 
to  "  the  bush."  Another  year  went  by  in  Manila, 
crowded  with  work,  and  the  summer  of  1904  came 
on.     On  May  5,  he  writes  to  his  aunt : 

*'  I  have  just  returned  from  a  trip  to  the  Visayan 
Islands,  where  I  have  been  inspecting  our  meteorologi- 
cal stations  in  those  regions  and  setting  up  a  system 
of  typhoon  signals  at  various  ports.  After  my  official 
work  was  done,  I  always  managed  to  round  up  our 
Catholic  soldiers.  .  .  . 

"  Time  is  flying,  and  I  am  getting  ready  for  my  de- 
parture. I  shall  leave  Manila  some  time  between  the 
5th  and  loth  of  June.  I  take  the  SS.  Mongolia  from 
Hongkong  on  June  15th.  From  there  we  go  to 
Shanghai,  thence  to  Japan,  thence  to  San  Francisco 


138  WILLIAM  STANTON 

by  way  of  Honolulu.  We  ought  to  make  San  Fran- 
cisco by  the  middle  of  July.  As  soon  as  I  arrive  I 
shall  let  you  know  whether  I  must  go  directly  to  St. 
Louis  or  may  take  a  southern  route  and  pass  through 
San  Antonio.     Pray  for  my  safe  passage.  .  .  ." 

He  did  visit  San  Antonio,  Texas,  whither  his 
family  had  removed,  and  then  came  on  to  the  head- 
quarters of  his  province,  St.  Louis,  before  setting 
out  for  Spain.     The  Manila  episode  was  over. 


CHAPTER  IX. 

I  hope  that  no  one  who  has  become  in  any  way- 
interested  in  Fr.  Stanton  will  skip  this  chapter.  It 
will  be  the  hardest  his  biographer  has  to  write.  It 
will  be  very  largely  unintelligible  to  most  non- 
Catholics:  a  mere  jumble  of  monkish  foolery.  But 
to  those  who  understand,  it  may  be  the  most  signifi- 
cant chapter  in  the  book.  Here,  if  anywhere,  if  the 
author  can  express  it  at  all,  lies  the  heart  of  Stanton, 
the  secret  that  gives  meaning  to  what  is  otherwise 
only  a  commonplace  life  of  a  commonplace  man, 
touched  off  with  the  cheap  notoriety  of  petty  travel 
and  the  superficial  interest  of  strange  places  and 
peoples.  For  this  chapter  shall  deal  especially  with 
that  most  elusive  of  all  subjects,  the  relation  of  the 
man's  soul  to  God. 

In  the  early  part  of  September,  Fr.  Stanton  sailed 
from  New  York  in  the  SS.  Baltic.  There  were 
four  Jesuits  in  the  party,  all  bound  for  Spain.  They 
travelled  rather  swiftly  through  Ireland,  England, 
Holland,  Belgium,  up  the  Rhine  to  Mayence, 
through  Switzerland,  thence  to  Barcelona  by  way  of 

139 


I40  WILLIAM  STANTON 

Lyons.  They  had  enough  languages  in  the  party  to 
carry  them  comfortably,  and  they  enjoyed  the  trip, 
with  Fr.  Stanton  as  the  life  of  the  party.  He 
reached  Manresa,  near  Barcelona,  in  the  beginning 
of  October.  Here,  in  the  Spanish  house  of  third 
probation,  he  was  to  spend  the  ensuing  ten  months. 
A  word  about  Manresa,  before  we  go  on  to  his 
life  there.  The  place  is,  of  course,  inseparably 
linked  with  the  memory  of  St.  Ignatius  Loyola. 
Here,  for  some  eight  or  ten  months,  the  Saint  had 
lived  after  his  "  conversion,"  in  a  cave  high  up  on 
the  rocky  face  of  a  cliff  almost  overhanging  the 
noisy  little  hill-stream,  the  Cardone,  which  flows 
through  the  town.  Here  he  had  written  "  The 
Spiritual  Exercises."  The  place  is  sacred  to  his 
followers.  The  Society's  house  crowns  the  cliff, 
and  is  built  down  the  face  of  it  far  enough  to  include 
the  "  holy  cave,"  and  the  house  is  called  La  Santa 
Cueva.  It  is  used  exclusively  for  the  young  priests 
of  the  Society  who  are  doing  their  last  year  of 
preparation;  though  its  little  chapel,  built  out  along 
the  cliff  as  an  extension  of  St.  Ignatius'  grotto,  is 
open  to  worshippers  from  the  town.  There  were 
in  the  house,  in  Fr.  Stanton's  time,  forty- four  "  ter- 
tians," as  the  men  in  their  third  year  of  probation 
are  called :  men  between  thirty-five  and  forty  years 


MANRESA  141 

of  age,  and  representing  half  a  dozen  nationalities. 

Their  life  externally  was  very  much  like  that  of 
the  novices;  quiet,  retired,  with  some  study  of  the 
Institute  of  the  Society;  giving  a  short  time  each 
day  to  little,  menial,  household  duties;  chiefly  de- 
voted to  prayer  and  reflection.  Do  not  think  it  a 
gloomy  life.  They  are  cheerful  bodies,  the  ter- 
tians ;  groaning  whimsically  at  times,  it  is  true,  over 
their  monotonous  routine;  looking  forward  often 
enough  to  the  end  of  the  year  and  their  return  to 
active  life;  but  sensibly  appreciative  of  their  oppor- 
tunity, with  the  mixture  of  earnestness  and  light- 
heartedness  which  is  the  stamp  of  the  religious.  Fr, 
Stanton  entered  upon  that  life  whole-souledly.  He 
was  tremendously  in  earnest,  as  his  companions 
testify;  but  he  was  sane  and  balanced  as  ever.  He 
indulged  in  no  flights  of  fancy  or  emotional  extrava- 
gances.    But  he  did  pray. 

What  a  thing  that  is,  prayer !  To  talk  with  God ! 
Prayer  for  a  moment,  the  swift  cry  of  the  heart  in 
need,  in  rejoicing  —  that  is  almost  natural :  "  lookin' 
at  God,  and  sayin'  a  word  to  Him,"  as  an  old  Irish- 
man put  it.  But  deliberately  to  set  one's  self  aside 
for  prayer,  to  walk  before  the  face  of  God  day  after 
day,  to  make  a  silence  in  one's  heart  where  His  voice 
may  be  heard  —  no  wonder  that  is  hard :  it  is  al- 


142  WILLIAM  STANTON 

most  terrifying.  Men  who  pray  are  like  those  who 
climb  high  mountains,  where  the  air  is  dizzyingly 
rare,  where  the  lungs  gasp,  where  the  will  must  sup- 
plement the  bodily  functions  to  live.  One  gets  used 
to  it  in  time,  as  one  gets  used  to  the  mountain  air; 
and  then  comes  the  vigour  and  the  exultation  of  the 
high  country.  But  no  metaphor  touches  the  reality 
of  its  hardships  or  of  its  glorious  strength.  We 
must  have  experienced  it  before  we  can  understand 
it.  We  must  have  known  its  loneliness  and  its  deso- 
lation and  its  astounding  comfort. 

Prayer  is  no  artificial  posing,  no  oleaginous 
mouthing  of  pious  platitudes,  no  windy  self-com- 
muning or  Pharisaical  self-gratulation.  It  is  not  an 
emotional  luxury,  as  the  world  so  often  thinks,  not 
an  emasculate  occupation,  to  be  left  to  women  — 
"  for  men  must  work,  and  women  must  weep,"  or 
pray,  as  they  will.  To  all  who  believe  in  God  it  is  a 
necessity,  at  times  a  dreadful  necessity,  fierce  as 
battle,  with  the  roar  of  unseen  worlds  in  our  ears. 
If  it  is  not  to  be  "  eat,  drink,  and  be  merry,  for  to- 
morrow you  die,"  then  we  must  pray.  If  life  is  a 
fight,  this  is  one  of  our  chief  weapons.  Prayer  has 
in  it  all  the  mystery  of  the  world  to  come,  and  all 
the  practicality  of  this  world.     It  is  the  bridge  be- 


MANRESA  143 

tween  the  two  worlds,  the  ladder  of  Jacob,  the 
astounding  commerce  of  man  with  God. 

I  have  no  wish  here  to  go  deeply  into  the  nature 
of  prayer,  nor  to  discuss  the  part  of  it  that  comes 
from  God's  initiative,  so  to  speak.  For  the  ordi- 
nary man,  prayer  is  simply  the  acts  of  his  own  mind 
and  will  aided,  of  course,  by  God's  ever-present 
grace.  And  ordinarily,  a  man  needs  to  grow  up  be- 
fore he  can  learn  to  pray  well ;  he  must  have  felt 
himself,  have  sensed  where  he  fits  in  the  scheme  of 
creation;  his  faith  must  have  been  exercised  in  the 
battering  of  the  years;  he  must  have  tasted  joys, 
and  known  failure,  and  made  mistakes,  and  indulged 
selfishness  in  some  measure,  and  repented,  and  been 
buffeted.  He  must  have  learned  what  a  broken 
reed  he  is  by  himself.  In  this  sense,  the  prayers  of 
inexperience  are  the  babblings  of  childhood.  It  is 
the  strong  man  only  who  comes  with  broken, 
humble,  thrilling  speech  before  God.  Work  for 
women !  —  it  is  almost  a  task  for  angels. 

Fr.  Stanton  was  a  grown  man  now,  a  man 
strong  in  the  knowledge  of  his  own  weakness. 
Once  more,  as  he  had  done  when  a  novice,  he  went 
through  the  complete  Spiritual  Exercises.  For 
thirty  days,  in  entire  silence,  he  gave  up  mind  and 


144  WILLIAM  STANTON 

memory  and  will  to  those  simple,  hard-headed,  yet 
awful  considerations:  the  dream  that  is  terrify ingly 
practical.  With  the  consciousness  of  standing 
naked  in  soul  before  Almighty  God,  he  went  back 
in  thought  over  his  life.  God  had  made  him,  God 
had  made  all  the  world  he  lived  in.  God  had  given 
him  his  Christian  parents,  his  vigour  of  body,  his 
gifts  of  intellect  and  temperament,  his  opportunities 
of  education,  his  graces,  his  vocation.  The  round 
earth  swam  before  his  eyes,  a  tiny  whirling  globe  in 
the  immensity  of  the  universe :  himself  an  infinites- 
imal figure  crawling  feebly  on  its  surface.  Yet  the 
earth  and  the  universe  was  for  him.  God  had  sent 
His  Son  here  upon  earth,  to  live,  and  to  die,  for  him. 
God  had  established  His  hierarchical  Church,  un- 
dying, unchanging  in  truth,  to  shelter  and  guide  and 
ward  over  him.  God  had  a  strange,  incomprehensi- 
ble happiness  waiting  for  him.  It  was  all  most  as- 
tonishing, it  was  humanly  incredible.  And  its  very 
incredibility  was  a  mark  of  its  truth:  men  could 
never  have  invented  such  a  concept.  It  was  the 
sort  of  thing  which  a  man  could  not  help  accepting; 
yet  before  which,  to  keep  his  sanity,  he  must  in  some 
sense  shrug  his  shoulders.  It  was  too  big  to  try  to 
fathom;  to  accept  it  was  enough.  Besides,  when 
one  looked  for  a  reason  for  it  all,  the  reason  was 


MANRESA  145 

still  more  astonishing:  that  God  loved  him!  loved 
him  intensely,  intimately,  patiently,  passionately! 
that  for  all  He  had  given,  He  had  still  infinitely 
more  to  give!  that  He  pursued  him  with  kindness! 

To  think  over  this  day  after  day!  to  keep  before 
his  mind  the  comradely,  human  figure  of  Christ, 
who  was  the  Infinite  God  —  and  his  brother !  to  see 
himself  and  all  the  world  of  men  through  the  eyes  of 
God!  How  simple  was  the  wheeling  mystery  of 
life :  for  it  all  reduced  to  one  supreme  mystery,  the 
love  of  God  for  men.  Every  command  was  to  keep 
men  from  hurting  themselves,  from  throwing  away 
treasures  for  baubles.  Every  thrill  of  human  happi- 
ness was  the  tiny  analogue  of  an  immense  happiness 
to  come.  Every  pain  and  weariness  and  heartache 
was  "  the  shade  of  His  hand,  outstretched  caress- 
ingly." Life  was  the  little  span,  the  hand-breadth 
of  waiting  before  the  gates  of  eternity:  and  death 
was  the  gasp  of  the  spirit  before  it  looked  upon 
God,  the  lover  of  souls. 

Oh,  it  was  good  to  live  for  that  God,  to  work 
for  Him,  to  help  other  men  to  see  this  vision!  It 
was  all  so  simple !  Yes,  it  might  frighten  a  man  a 
little  to  think  of  venturing  at  all  into  such  an  incom- 
prehensibly simple  scheme.  But  that  was  God's 
way;  He  wanted  men  to  help  in  it;  He  smiled  at 


146  WILLIAM  STANTON 

their  shrinking  fears  —  and  what  could  a  man  do 
but  smile  back !  To  do  anything  for  Him,  who  had 
done  everything  for  us !  If  only  He  would  let  him ! 
Let  him !  —  why,  God  had  invited  him.  That  was 
what  it  meant  to  be  a  Jesuit,  to  be  a  priest :  to  help 
God,  to  help  Him  spread  happiness  and  love  over  the 
world. 

A  month  of  this,  did  I  say  ?  A  month,  when  his 
comrades  saw  him  constantly  in  the  chapel,  before 
the  Blessed  Sacrament  —  God  amongst  men,  the 
Christ  of  Galilee  hidden  in  a  mystery ;  when  his  com- 
rades marvelled  at  his  entire  preoccupation,  at  his 
quiet,  unruffled  absorption  in  his  own  thoughts? 
Put  it  down  as  ten  months,  rather.  For  the  re- 
maining nine  months  of  the  tertianship  were  only  a 
continuation  of  that  first.  Oh,  he  wasn't  a  mystic. 
Nor  did  he  go  about  dreaming.  He  shouldered  his 
broom  with  the  rest  of  them,  and  swept  unmention- 
able insects  out  of  the  chapel  along  the  cliff,  and 
made  jokes  about  them ;  and  ate  heartily  afterwards ; 
and  went  for  long  tramps  in  the  hills  whenever  he 
was  given  a  chance  —  and  got  lost,  as  usual,  and 
came  home  late,  and  got  a  wigging ;  and  had  a  family 
of  lizards  and  bugs  and  things  in  his  room,  like  the 
great  boy  that  he  was ;  and  studied  the  technicalities 
of  the  Institute,  and  practised  his  Spanish ;  and  was 


MANRESA  ■  147 

still  "  Buck  "  Stanton.  But  the  fire  that  had  burned 
in  his  life  deepened  its  glow,  and  he  rambled  and 
worked  and  chatted  and  laughed  with  the  vision  of 
Christ  before  him,  and  a  hunger  in  his  heart  to  do 
Christ's  work  among  men.  He  hated  religious  os- 
tentation now  as  much  as  ever ;  but  he  slipped  round 
to  the  chapel  the  moment  he  was  free  from  other 
duties.  It  is  not  shocking  at  all  —  quite  a  normal 
touch  of  human  nature  —  to  say  that  many  of  the 
Spaniards,  with  their  well-merited  pride  of  race, 
rather  looked  down  upon  the  free  and  semi-heretical 
Yankees :  not  in  any  unpleasant  way,  but  quite  in  a 
taken-for-granted  manner,  as  the  sons  of  a  hundred 
generations  in  the  Faith  upon  these  offspring  of  yes- 
terday in  a  savage  land.  But  your  Spaniard,  even 
when  a  Jesuit,  is  a  singularly  honest  man,  and  in  no 
great  time  his  Spanish  comrades  doffed  their  hats 
to  Fr.  Stanton's  religious  character.  (They  at- 
tributed it  to  his  Irish  ancestry.)  The  other 
Yankees  were  made  aware  of  their  respect ;  but  there 
might  have  been  a  row  if  it  had  come  to  his  ears. 

His  was  a  faith  in  God  that  had  always  been 
strong  and  clear,  from  boyhood;  but  henceforth  it 
was  to  rule  his  life  with  a  singular  vividness  and 
completeness.  He  was  now  a  man  consecrated  to 
God's  work,  not  with  any  sense  of  giving  on  his 


148  WILLIAM  STANTON 

part,  but  with  the  eagerness  of  one  who  knows  that 
work  to  be  a  privilege.  There  is  ordinarily  a  cer- 
tain exaggeration  in  saying  that  a  man  divests  him- 
self of  all  selfishness;  but  it  becomes  strikingly  true, 
when  a  man  has  so  envisaged  himself  and  all  the 
world  in  their  relation  to  God  as  to  see  no  purpose 
really  worth  while  except  God's  purpose.  Then 
God's  interests  become  his  interests.  The  man 
seeks  himself  still,  as  he  must  by  his  very  nature, 
but  he  seeks  himself  in  God.  His  success  is  to  see 
God's  plan  succeed ;  his  delight  is  in  the  happiness 
that  he  can  help  to  promote  amongst  men ;  his  burden 
is  the  burden  of  all  the  world;  and  his  glory  is  the 
glory  of  God.  So  Fr.  Stanton  learned  to  see  and 
to  seek,  in  Manresa. 

It  is  hard  to  write  of  such  things.  What  illumina- 
tive details  we  have  are  very  sacred  to  the  man ; 
there  is  a  sort  of  desecration  in  speaking  of  them. 
The  effect  of  it  all  must  be  read  in  his  life,  blunder- 
ingly pieced  together  out  of  little  acts  of  self-immo- 
lation. As  the  year  went  on,  he  had  to  consider 
what  might  be  his  actual  field  of  endeavor  for  God. 
Fr.  Algue  wanted  him  back  in  Manila.  His  place  in 
the  Observatory  was  waiting  for  him.  The  work 
was  congenial,  the  surroundings  pleasant.  There 
was   a   splendid   opening    for   his   ambition   as   a 


MANRESA  149 

scientist.  He  had  letters  from  high  officials,  ex- 
pressing the  hope  that  he  would  return.  He  had 
many  friends  in  Manila;  he  would  enjoy  excellent 
society;  he  was  assured  of  comfortable  material  con- 
ditions. And  withal,  he  could  do  a  great  deal  of 
work  for  souls  too.  Then  he  thought  of  the  Indians 
down  in  Central  America,  a  half -civilized  people,  a 
singularly  uninteresting  people,  not  so  very  numer- 
ous, a  small  field  for  his  activity.  Prudently,  he 
talked  the  matter  over  with  one  or  two,  asked  ad- 
vice of  his  director.  He  heard  the  usual  things: 
men  are  needed  in  the  great  centers,  his  exceptional 
scientific  gifts  and  equipment  marked  him  out  for 
fine  work  in  entomology,  he  had  the  character  to  im- 
press educated  men  and  women,  other  less  talented 
men  might  look  after  the  Indians  just  as  well, — 
he  should  go  to  Manila.  You  may  see  a  good  deal 
of  what  his  year  in  Manresa  was,  from  his  conclu- 
sion in  the  matter. 

He  wrote  to  his  provincial  in  St.  Louis,  laying 
the  question  before  him.  As  he  said  in  his  letter, 
he  had  noticed  "  that  our  Lord,  when  on  earth,  had 
always  had  the  keenest  eye  out  for  the  chap  who  was 
in  most  need."  In  Manila  there  were  plenty  of 
priests,  and  others  willing  to  go  there ;  there  was  a 
sufficiency,  if  not  an  abundance,  of  money  too.     In 


I50  WILLIAM  STANTON 

Central  America  there  were  very  few  priests,  and 
not  many  wlio  were  willing  to  go ;  and  the  little  mis- 
sion was  as  poor  as  Job's  turkey.  Without  any 
cant  or  show,  he  asked  his  provincial  to  send  him  to 
Central  America.  Then  he  sat  back  and  waited  for 
his  decision.  He  had  chosen  according  to  his  lights ; 
let  God  do  the  rest. 

On  June  i8,  1905,  he  wrote  to  his  aunt: 

"  Cueva  de  San  Ignacio,  Manresa. 

"  My  dearest  Aunt :  I  received  your  last  welcome 
letter  in  due  time,  but  have  delayed  until  now  to 
answer,  because  I  had  no  definite  news  to  tell  you.  On 
Pentecost  Sunday,  however,  I  received  from  my  pro- 
vincial one  of  the  most  welcome  letters  I  have  ever  re- 
ceived in  my  life.  In  it  he  tells  me  that  it  has  been 
decided  that  I  am  destined  to  found  a  new  mission  in 
the  Cayo  district  of  British  Honduras,  among  the 
abandoned  tribes  of  Maya  and  Lacandon  Indians  there. 

"  What  greater  favour  could  the  Lord  bestow  on  me 
than  to  choose  me  for  such  apostolic  work !  And  what 
greater  joy  for  a  son  of  Ignatius  and  a  brother  of 
Francis  Xavier  and  Peter  Claver  and  a  thousand  other 
missionaries  of  the  Society,  than  to  be  allowed  to  give 
his  life  and  strength  to  save  the  souls  of  poor  aban- 
doned Indians  in  the  forests  and  jungles  of  Central 
America !  Well,  it  has  been  my  constant  prayer  for 
many  years  that  the  Lord  might  give  me  such  a  voca- 
tion, and  it  seems  He  has  heard  my  prayer.  I  am  sure 
you  will  rejoice  with  me,  and  give  thanks  to  God  for 
such  a  blessing.  .  .  ." 


MANRESA  151 

It  is  almost  distressingly  outspoken  for  a  man 
of  his  spiritual  reticence.  But  then,  you  see,  he 
was  a  little  bit  beside  himself  with  delight;  and  a 
man  gets  reckless  then. 

Does  it  sound  like  a  man  who  had  become  some- 
thing of  a  visionary,  who  had  lost  a  little  of  his 
humanness  in  the  rapture  of  an  exalted,  supreme 
ideal?  If  it  does,  we  have  misunderstood  him. 
The  same  letter  goes  on  with  boyishly  affectionate 
plans  for  running  around  to  San  Antonio  on  his  way 
through  the  States  to  Central  America,  and  is  full  of 
tender,  playful  concern  in  all  the  minutiae  of  his 
family's  life.  But  he  was  never  to  see  the  dear  aunt 
again,  nor  any  of  his  family,  until  he  lay  upon  his 
death-bed,  years  after. 


CHAPTER  X 

The  end  of  July  saw  the  close  of  the  tertianship, 
and  Fr.  Stanton  and  his  companions  set  out  on 
their  return  to  the  States.  They  visited,  en  route, 
Gandia,  the  old  home  of  St.  Francis  Borgia,  Pam- 
plona and  Loyola  and  Lourdes;  and  came  through 
Paris  to  London.  Here  Fr.  Stanton  delayed  about 
six  weeks,  studying  entomology  and  the  like  in  the 
British  Museum  and  the  South  Kensington.  It  was 
not  a  great  deal  of  time,  but  he  knew  quite  definitely 
what  he  wanted  to  look  up,  and  he  worked  very 
hard,  gathering  notes  on  Philippine  insects  and  on 
some  of  the  tropical  fauna  of  Central  America.  He 
crossed  in  the  Cunard  SS.  Umhria,  reaching  New 
York  on  September  23,  and  was  in  St.  Louis  by  the 
end  of  the  month. 

From  the  time  he  had  first  learned  his  destina- 
tion, he  had  planned  to  visit  his  family  in  San 
Antonio,  on  his  way  to  Belize.  But  in  St.  Louis 
he  was  told  that  yellow  fever  had  broken  out  in 
New  Orleans  which  was  in  consequence  quarantined, 
and  that  he  must  therefore  sail  from  Mobile.    More- 


BRITISH  HONDURAS  AGAIN        153 

over,  a  party  was  waiting  for  him;,  their  steamer 
was  scheduled  to  sail  on  October  6;  it  was  impos- 
sible to  make  the  big  detour  around  to  San  Antonio. 
"  Man  proposes,  and  God  disposes  "  was  at  all  times 
a  favourite  saying  with  him.  He  could  say  it  again 
now,  though  this  last  disposition  was  particularly 
hard.  At  any  rate,  thank  God,  he  had  seen  them 
all  only  a  year  before;  that  was  pretty  good  fortune, 
as  things  go  with  a  Jesuit.  He  tried  to  cheer  them 
under  the  disappointment,  and  hustled  off  to  Mobile. 
After  a  rough,  blustery  passage  in  the  Anselm  — 
during  which,  as  usual,  he  was  sick  enough  —  they 
landed  in  Belize  on  October  10.  There  were  many 
who  remembered  him.  His  old  boys,  now  grown 
into  men,  flocked  around  him.  It  was  good  to  be 
with  them  again.  He  felt  at  home.  But  there  was 
little  time  for  chatting.  His  companions  were  as- 
signed to  the  college  in  Belize ;  he  was  to  strike  out 
into  the  west  of  the  Colony,  to  begin  a  new  mission 
in  the  Cayo  District.  The  Maya  Indians  at  Benque 
Viejo,  on  the  Mopan  River,  had  long  been  asking 
for  a  priest.  The  Vicar  Apostolic  in  Belize,  Bishop 
Hopkins,  had  promised  to  send  them  one  when  he 
could.  But  all  his  priests  were,  like  himself,  Jesuits ; 
and  he  had  to  wait  until  he  could  coax  another  man 
out  of  the  Missouri  Province.    In  the  meantime^  he 


154  WILLIAM  STANTON 

had  urged  the  people  of  Benque  Viejo  to  bnild  a 
church.  They  had  been  three  years  at  it,  and  now 
it  was  ready;  and  Fr.  Stanton  was  to  take  charge 
of  it. 

Three  days  after  his  arrival  in  Belize,  he  wrote 
to  his  aunt: 

"...  I  am  busy  these  days  trying  to  gather  together 
a  few  of  the  most  essential  articles  for  my  priestly 
work  and  for  my  house,  as  there  is  absolutely  nothing 
there  yet,  not  a  vestment  or  ornament  for  the  church, 
nor  a  pan  or  kettle  for  the  house.  But  there  is  no 
doubt  but  Providence  will  gradually  provide  in  one  way 
or  another  for  what  is  most  necessary.  My  poor 
Mayas  up  there  have  little  or  nothing,  but  are  begging 
for  a  priest,  and  so  we  must  make  a  beginning.  I  must 
open  the  mission  alone,  but  it  is  the  Lord's  work,  and 
He  is  just  as  near  one  in  the  forests  and  lagoons  of  the 
Cayo  as  on  your  neat  asphalted  streets  of  San  Antonio. 
.  .  .  Of  course  there  is  no  regular  mail  service  up  to 
my  mission,  but  if  mail  is  sent  for  me  to  St.  John's 
College,  Belize,  it  will  reach  me. 

"  I  ask  you  all  to  pray  that  God  may  bless  my  work 
amongst  the  Mayas.  .  .  ." 

He  gathered  together  some  tinned  provisions,  a 
few  cooking  utensils,  one  set  of  white  vestments, 
two  altar  stones,  and  a  few  other  odds  and  ends. 
In  a  week  or  so  more  he  was  ready  to  start.  The 
Bishop  accompanied  him,  to  introduce  him  to  his 


BRITISH  HONDURAS  AGAIN        155 

new  flock.  It  was  the  middle  of  the  Rains,  and  the 
river  was  in  flood.  That  gave  them  a  hope  of 
getting  up  the  better  part  of  the  distance  by  gaso- 
Hne  launch.  They  started  out  bravely,  and  as  the 
current  was  not  so  strong  in  the  lower  reaches  of 
the  river,  they  made  thirty-five  miles  the  first  day, 
and  tied  up  to  the  bank  for  the  night.  The  next 
morning  the  pin  holding  the  flywheel  of  the  engine 
broke,  and  they  had  to  wait  whilst  the  engineer 
sawed  a  new  pin  out  of  a  piece  of  iron. 

As  they  passed  little  villages,  most  of  them  with 
outlandish  names,  the  people  begged  them  to  stop 
and  baptize  their  babies,  but  they  were  hurrying, 
and  the  Bishop  promised  to  attend  to  them  all  on 
his  way  back.  They  feared  the  flood  would  go 
down  in  the  river,  when  they  would  have  to  take  to 
"  pitpans,"  the  long,  native  canoe,  hollowed  out  of  a 
couple  of  tree  trunks,  and  their  journey  up  river 
would  run  to  weeks  instead  of  days.  The  third 
day  the  river  did  begin  to  fall  rapidly,  and  by  even- 
ing had  gone  down  about  two  feet.  They  met 
rapids  in  the  upper  river,  and  had  to  pole  their 
launch  through.  That  day  Fr.  Stanton,  perched, 
pipe  in  mouth,  on  the  bow  of  the  launch,  shot  four 
alligators  with  his  rifle.  But  at  last,  on  October  2^, 
they  reached  the  Cayo,  which  was  as  far  as  the 


156  WILLIAM  STANTON 

launch  could  possibly  go.  Above  this  the  Mopan 
was  full  of  falls  and  rapids.  Their  goods  had  to  be 
transported  the  rest  of  the  way  by  land. 

At  the  Cayo,  the  District  Commissioner,  Mr. 
Robert  Franklin,  welcomed  them,  and  gave  them  the 
hospitality  of  his  house.  The  Alcalde,  or  Mayor  of 
the  town,  lent  Fr.  Stanton  four  cargadores  (port- 
ers) to  carry  his  possessions  to  Benque  Viejo.  The 
Bishop  and  Fr.  Stanton  stayed  several  days  to  at- 
tend to  the  spiritual  wants  of  the  six  hundred 
Catholics  in  the  Cayo;  then  they  set  out  on  bor- 
rowed horses  for  Fr.  Stanton's  headquarters  at 
Benque  Viejo.  We  may  quote  the  rest  from  his 
letter  home : 

".  .  .  We  rode  four  hours  in  the  rain  through  the 
tropical  jungle,  along  winding  paths  called  roads, 
where  the  horses  often  sank  almost  to  their  bellies  in 
the  sticky  mud.  Toward  the  end  of  the  journey  it 
stopped  raining,  and  we  were  met  at  the  Indian  town  of 
Succotz,  a  mile  from  our  destination,  by  the  Alcalde 
and  the  village  band,  i.e.,  three  Indians  with  very  long 
wooden  flutes  and  a  guitar. 

"  The  whole  town  turned  out  to  see  us.  They  pre- 
sented us  with  a  milky  drink  made  of  crushed  sweet 
corn,  some  freshly  laid  eggs,  and  oranges.  The  poor 
people  offered  us  the  best  they  had.  They  told  us  how 
glad  they  were  to  have  a  padre  come  to  live  amongst 
them. 


BRITISH  HONDURAS  AGAIN        157 

"  We  soon  passed  on  to  Benque  Vie  jo.  They  had 
been  warned  of  our  coming,  and  half  a  mile  away  we 
were  met  by  about  a  hundred  little  Indian  children, 
who  sang  us  a  song  of  welcome,  kissed  our  hands,  and 
then  marched  in  front  of  us  into  the  village. 

"  I  have  about  eight  hundred  people  here  at  Benque 
Viejo.  They  are  Maya  Indians.  Some  talk  a  little 
Spanish,  but  most  of  them  only  Maya,  which  I  studied 
when  I  was  in  the  mission  the  first  time.  My  district 
comprises  over  thirty  villages,  and  I  am  the  only  priest ; 
so  you  see  I  have  work  before  me.  Some  of  the  vil- 
lages have  such  nice  names :  Succotz,  Coquericot, 
Monkey  Run,  Young  Gal,  Yaalbaac,  Holotonich, 
Kaxivenic,  Pull  Frock,  Duck  Run,  Pull-and-be-Damn 
Rapids,  etc. 

"  My  people  in  Benque  Viejo  are  building  me  a  fine 
house,  quite  a  palace  for  this  region,  about  15x30 
feet,  walls  10  feet  high,  built  of  sticks  plastered  with 
mud,  with  a  high  sloping  roof  of  palm  leaves.  It  will 
be  all  in  one  room,  and  the  floor  of  clay.  Just  now  I 
am  living  in  a  borrowed  house.  I  cook  my  own  break- 
fast, but  one  of  the  women  cooks  me  the  principal  meal 
once  a  day,  and  everything  is  going  along  well. 

*'  No  time  to  write  more,  as  I  want  to  send  this  by 
an  Indian  who  is  going  to  the  Cayo  to-day.  .  .  ." 

In  the  meantime  the  river  had  fallen  so  much  that 
no  launch  could  get  to  the  Cayo,  and  the  Bishop  re- 
turned to  Belize  in  a  small  dorey  —  a  smaller  craft 
than  a  pitpan,  hollowed  out  of  a  single  log. 

Fr.  Stanton's  position  in  Benque  Viejo  was  really 
one  of  destitution.    But  he  was  as  cheerful  as  a  lark 


158  WILLIAM  STANTON 

about  it  all.  He  did  write  a  begging  letter  to  St. 
Louis  University  (which  we  shall  cite  directly),  but 
forgot  to  send  it,  and  discovered  it  only  when  he 
was  "  cleaning  house  "  about  a  month  later.  How- 
ever, as  his  more  pressing  needs  began  to  clamour, 
he  asked  his  brethren  in  Belize  to  help  him,  out  of 
their  own  poverty.  But  we  shall  see  that  his  de- 
mands were  singularly  modest.  He  writes  to  a 
Father  in  Belize : 

"  The  Inland  Summer  Resort, 

"  Benque  on  the  Mopan, 

Nov.  29,  1905. 

"  My  dear  Father  B 

"  P.C. 

"  Cheer  up,  old  man,  wipe  away  the  memories  of  the 
sabanones  of  Manresa  and  the  prickly  heat  of  Belize, 
and  take  a  trip  to  beautiful  Benque  on  the  shady  banks 
of  the  roaring  Mopan.  The  Padre's  house  is  progress- 
ing poco  a  poco  according  to  the  costumbre  del  pais. 
Last  week  they  filled  in  the  framework  of  the  walls 
with  thin  poles  freshly  cut  from  the  bosque.  To-day 
they  have  started  the  plastering  or  filling  in  between  the 
poles.  This  is  Benque  Viejo  plaster:  we  believe  in 
fostering  home  industries  here,  and  everything  in  the 
building  of  our  houses  is  home-grown.  A  hole  is  dug 
in  the  side  of  the  hill  on  which  the  house  stands,  the 
mud  is  brought  up  into  the  house,  mixed  with  water 
and  chopped  up  green  grass,  and  smeared  on  the  poles 
by  hand. 

"  After  the  plastering  is  finished  inside  and  out,  they 


BRITISH  HONDURAS  AGAIN        159 

will  begin  on  the  clay  floor.  When  this  is  well 
pounded  and  levelled,  it  must  rest  for  a  couple  of  weeks 
to  harden.  In  the  meantime  the  doors  and  windows 
are  to  be  made,  and  this  is  the  hardest  part  of  the 
building,  as  the  boards  have  all  to  be  made  by  hand. 
The  thatch  roof  is  already  finished.  The  final  touch 
will  be  the  whitewashing  inside  and  out,  and  then  the 
most  handsome  palace  in  Benque  will  be  done.  They 
hope  to  have  it  ready  for  occupancy  by  New  Year. 
Then  we  shall  welcome  tourists  from  Belize  —  pro- 
vided they  bring  their  own  hammocks. 

"  My  cook  is  sick  now,  and  I  am  playing  cook  myself 
for  a  few  days.  My  ordinary  bill  of  fare  is  not 
exactly  sybaritic,  but  it  is  all  right  for  one  with  a  cast- 
iron  stomach  and  a  good  appetite.  I  went  out  the 
other  day  and  shot  a  squirrel  and  a  toucan,  and  saw  the 
tracks  of  deer,  peccary,  and  a  huge  tiger,  but  didn't 
see  the  beasts.  Fresh  meat  is  hard  to  get.  They  kill 
pigs  and  beef  occasionally  in  Plancha  Piedra,  over  in 
Guatemala,  and  we  buy  it  at  five  reals  a  pound.  Eggs 
are  not  to  be  had  for  love  or  money  in  Benque.  Noth- 
ing but  pigs,  goats,  and  garrapatas  raised  in  the  town. 

"  Just  wait  till  the  Padre  gets  his  house  and  garden 
in  running  order,  and  Benque  will  have  vegetables, 
chickens,  and  eggs.  Positively  the  only  vegetable 
grown  here  is  a  sort  of  round,  small  squash.  .  .  , 

"  Lo  and  behold !  I  have  just  now  received  a  letter 
from  Franklin  telling  me  of  a  cutting  scrape  in  S.  Jose. 
He  starts  for  the  scene  to-morrow,  and  asks  me  to  come 
along  —  woman  cut  —  will  probably  die.  Shall  go,  of 
course  —  first  sick  call  in  Cayo  mission  —  good  be- 
ginning—  five  or  six  days  journey  going  and  coming 
—  look  at  your  map  and  find  S.  Jose,  up  near  boundary 


i6o  WILLIAM  STANTON 

of  Orange  Walk  District.  Shall  be  glad  of  the  chance 
to  take  in  on  the  way  Yaalbaac  and  several  other 
places. 

"  Excuse  my  abruptness,  as  it  is  late  at  night  and  I 
must  get  ready  for  my  trip  in  the  morning.  To  save 
postage  and  time,  let  me  just  jot  down  a  few  things  I 
shall  need  before  long,  so  that  you  may  try  to  get  them 
for  me  at  the  first  opportunity. 

"  I.  A  spade,  hoe,  and  rake,  for  garden  use. 
"  2.  A  carpenter's  chisel,  plane,  brace  and  2  bits. 
"  3.  Four  brass  shells  for  reloading  (12  bore)  centre 
fire,  with  a  few  boxes  of  percussion  caps  to  suit ; 
some  powder  and  shot  —  a  few  buckshot  and  a 
good   supply   of   birdshot.     (Paper   shells   get 
damp  here  and  are  apt  to  cause  trouble.) 
"  4.  Seeds  for  garden.     I  should  like  to  try  ochra, 
gumbo,  egg-plant,  onions,  the  large  sweet  pep- 
pers, lettuce,  beets,  carrots,  peas,  tomatos,  but- 
ter beans,  muskmelon,  and  a  good  variety  of 
squash.     Any  good  fruit  seeds  or  seeds  of  orna- 
mental plants  would  be  acceptable. 
"  5.  A  roll  of  barbed  wire  for  fencing,  to  keep  out 
quadrupeds   and   bipeds    from    forbidden   pre- 
cincts. 
"  Must  finish  in  a  hurry.     Congratulations  on  your 
work  with  old  boys  and  in  college.     Here  I  find  that 
outside  of  Cayo  and  Benque  practically  everything  is 
Maya  and  few  of  the  people  know  anything  else.     If 
you  speak  Spanish  they  will  say  '  si,  si,'  but  they  don't 
know  what  you're  talking  about  till  they  get  it  in  their 
own  tongue ;  then  there  is  often  quite  a  different  song. 
"  Remember  me  in  the  Holy  Sacrifice,  old  man ;  I 
need  all  the  spiritual  help  possible.     The  field  is  fear- 


BRITISH  HONDURAS  AGAIN        i6r 

fully  wild;  deplorable  ignorance,  superstitions,  and 
deep-seated  long-standing  evil  customs  to  be  rooted  out. 
But  the  grace  of  God  is  all  powerful,  and  I  have  hopes 
of  at  least  clearing  off  the  timber  and  preparing  the 
land  for  the  sowers  and  reapers  that  may  come  after- 
ward." 

But  he  did  not  go  to  San  Jose  with  the  District 
Commissioner.  Two  days  later,  from  the  Cayo, 
he  adds  a  note  to  the  preceding  letter,  written  on  a 
torn  half  sheet  of  the  D.  C.'s  official  embossed  paper : 

"  Got  as  far  as  Cayo,  but  shan't  get  further  this  trip. 
The  D.  C.  could  not  wait,  had  to  start  for  S.  Jose  yes- 
terday morning  instead  of  to-day,  so  I  got  left;  but 
will  make  use  of  the  time  here  very  well.  Shall  return 
to  Benque  to-morrow  evening. 

"  But  roads  !  roads  !  In  this  district  they  are  simply 
unspeakable.  You  can  have  no  idea  of  what  roads  are 
here,  at  least  in  this  season.  It  is  only  a  little  over  nine 
miles  from  Benque  to  Cayo,  and  a  few  days  ago  it  took 
me  five  hours  to  do  it  on  horseback,  and  yesterday 
again  five  and  a  half  hours  on  a  mule.  Rain  and  the 
dark  caught  me  in  both  instances,  and  I  was  alone  — 
had  no  guide.  It  was  so  dark  I  could  not  see  the 
horse's  head,  but  my  guardian  angel  finally  brought  me 
through  all  right. 

"  There  is  no  doubt,  however,  that  I  am  built  for  the 
bush.  My  health  is  splendid.  As  for  the  climate  of 
Benque,  it  is  fine  so  far.  Hot  enough  of  course  during 
the  day,  but  the  nights  are  cool,  or  rather  cold.  When 
I  get  up  in  the  mornings  my  thermometer  marks  as 


i62  WILLIAM  STANTON 

low  as  63  or  even  60  F.     I  have  been  wrapping  myself 

in  Fr.  W 's  mackintosh  and  cassock  and  towels  to 

keep  warm.  Finally  I  could  not  stand  it  at  night,  and 
I  had  to  buy  a  blanket  here  in  the  Cayo  —  about  four 
feet  square  —  for  which  I  paid  $2.00  gold. 

"  In  Benque  I  haven't  felt  a  mosquito  and  have  never 
used  my  net.  But  here  at  Cayo  there  are  clouds  of 
mosquitos.  The  only  beasts  that  bother  me  are  the 
garrapatas  (ticks).  I  have  to  spend  from  an  hour 
and  a  half  to  two  hours  every  day  picking  off  ticks, 
and  my  whole  body  is  thickly  peppered  with  blotchy 
little  sores  where  they  have  left  their  mark.  But  one 
can't  expect  to  have  everything  his  own  way  in  this  life, 
even  in  the  paradise  of  Benque. 

"  By  the  way,  before  I  forget,  would  you  try  to  send 
me  a  wash  basin  or  bowl,  of  glazed  metal.  I  have 
searched  for  one  through  Cayo  and  Benque  in  vain, 
and  have  nothing  but  the  huge  tin  dishpan  of  the 
kitchen  to  wash  my  face  in.  It  is  a  little  inconvenient 
to  scour  the  grease  out  of  this  every  time  I  want  to 
wash  —  and  I  don't  want  to  fall  into  pure  Spanish 
costumbres.  I  get  a  real  bath  in  the  rushing  waters 
of  the  Mopan. 

"  Tell  the  brothers,  when  sending  things  up  to  me,  to 
pack  them  if  possible  in  good  kerosene  boxes ;  first, 
because  everything  has  to  be  carried  on  the  backs  of 
men  from  Cayo  to  Benque ;  and  secondly,  because  the 
boxes  themselves  are  invaluable  to  me,  as  a  board  of 
any  kind  in  Benque  is  as  scarce  as  a  snake  in  Ireland. 
Hasta  otro  rato !  " 

Whilst  this  letter  does  not  say  much  directly, 
there  is  in  it  sufficient  implication  of  rather  primi- 


BRITISH  HONDURAS  AGAIN        163 

tive  conditions.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  his  house 
equipment  might  be  listed  very  briefly.  He  had  a 
packing  case  for  table,  and  for  chair  a  box  that  had 
held  tinned  goods.  Some  one  gave  him  a  native 
bed:  four  posts  joined  together  by  boards,  with  ropes 
crisscrossed  from  top  to  bottom,  on  which  was  laid 
a  mat  woven  of  palm  leaves.  He  had  a  small  kero- 
sene stove,  one  cup,  one  saucer,  one  plate,  one  glass, 
knife  and  fork  and  spoon,  a  skillet,  a  frying  pan, 
and  the  very  important  dishpan. 

The  District  Commissioner  came  over  to  Benque 
Viejo  one  day,  and  called  on  Fr.  Stanton.  He  was 
invited  to  stop  and  have  tea.  Fr.  Stanton  was  cook. 
He  chatted  away,  brewed  his  tea,  put  a  nice  clean 
newspaper  on  the  packing  case,  and  set  the  table, 
placing  on  it  his  lone  plate  and  cup  and  saucer. 
When  everything  was  ready,  he  drew  up  a  couple  of 
boxes,  and  seated  himself  cheerfully  at  the  place 
where  the  dishes  were. 

"  Will  you  have  sugar?  "  he  asked  the  D.  C. 

"  Delighted !  "  said  his  guest,  holding  out  his 
hand,  the  palm  cupped. 

"  Good  Lord !  "  Stanton  groaned.  "  That's  what 
comes  of  living  alone!  "  He  had  his  tea  out  of  his 
tooth-glass. 

The  D.  C.  was  an  enthusiastic  admirer  of  Fr. 


i64  WILLIAM  STANTON 

Stanton.  Perhaps  his  admiration  was  the  partial 
explanation  of  why  he  became  a  Catholic,  not  long 
after. 

His  church  was  almost  worse  off  than  his  house. 
In  the  letter  to  St.  Louis  University,  just  spoken 
of,  he  gives  a  few  details : 

".  .  .  When  the  provincial  sent  me,  he  told  me  to 
get  down  here  and  then  squeal  for  what  I  needed. 
Well,  I'm  trying  to  squeal,  but  it's  a  long  squeal  from 
here  to  St.  L.  U.  .  .  .  For  heaven's  sake,  try  to  get  me 
a  portable  altar  stone,  with  the  necessary  appurtenances. 
I  have  forty  stations  to  get  around  to.  I  have  two 
altar  stones,  one  at  the  Cayo,  the  other  here  at  Benque. 
But  they  each  weigh  about  fifteen  pounds,  and  you  can 
imagine  what  my  one  vestment  looks  like  after  it  has 
been  crushed  up  v/ith  one  of  them  and  a  few  more 
traps  in  my  saddle-bags.  .  .  . 

"  Could  you  get  me  a  few  thin,  light  vestments,  small 
metal  cruets,  etc.  ?  And  my  big  church  at  Benque  — 
my  sacristans  using  empty  whiskey  bottles  for  candle- 
sticks and  flower  vases,  because  we  have  nothing  better 
—  not  a  statue  —  four  horrible,  dirty  chromos,  falling 
to  pieces,  the  only  pictures  in  the  church  —  no  censer, 
nor  cope,  nor  decent  crucifix  —  antiquated,  worm-eaten 
missal  —  no  ciborium  —  no  ostensorium  —  only  one 
chalice,  very  clumsy  to  pack  on  horseback.  .  .  . 

"  I  am  not  squealing  for  my  own  house,  but  for  the 
Lord's.  My  good  little  mud  house,  with  its  hammock 
slung  in  a  corner  under  the  thatch,  and  a  couple  of 
packing  cases  for  furniture,  is  quite  a  palace  for  these 


BRITISH  HONDURAS  AGAIN        165 

parts ;  even  if  the  pigs  and  goats  of  the  village  do 
break  in  now  and  then  to  make  a  meal  off  one's  old 
boots  or  the  scabbard  of  one's  machete.  Two  holes  in 
one  side,  closed  with  wooden  shutters,  serve  as  win- 
dows. When  it  rains,  I  close  them  up  and  light  a 
candle :  glass  is  an  unknown  luxury  here. 

"  My  bush  church  too  is  fine ;  same  architecture  as 
my  house,  only  larger.  In  church,  the  men  stand 
around  the  walls,  whilst  the  women  and  children  squat 
on  the  clay  floor  and  the  babies  roll  all  over,  garbed 
only  in  angelic  innocence.  .  .  . 

"  I  am  well  enough  off,  so  far  as  board  and  lodging 
go;  though  our  Benque  menu  might  not  suit  every 
stomach.  Tortilla,  or  corn-cake,  is  the  chief  stand-by 
—  flour,  when  it  can  be  had,  is  too  dear  (eighty-seven 
dollars  Mexican  a  barrel,  as  last  quoted).  Rice  and 
beans  are  the  other  staples  —  no  green  vegetables  of 
any  kind,  except  red-hot  chile,  which  they  eat  with  the 
leathery  tortillas  to  make  'em  go  down  —  no  eggs  for 
love  or  money  —  meat  scarce.  .  .  .  The  bush  has 
plenty  of  game,  but  it  would  mean  a  little  work  to  get 
it,  and  work  isn't  on  their  programme  here. 

"  The  talk  about  the  weekly  launch  from  Belize  to 
the  Cayo  is  somewhat  of  a  joke.  It  gets  up  when 
there  is  a  big  flood  on  the  river,  and  not  otherwise. 
The  Bishop  and  I  were  fortunate  enough  to  get  up 
a  couple  of  months  ago,  and  that  is  the  last  launch  seen 
at  the  Cayo.  The  Bishop  went  home  by  dorey. 
Hence  prices  of  provisions  and  stuffs  of  all  kinds  sent 
from  Belize  still  hold  their  own  —  e.g.,  condensed  milk, 
$1.00  a  tin.  So,  blessed  is  the  man  who  can  live  on 
bush  products,  and  do  without  the  frills.  .  .  ." 

"  P.S.    Look  at  the  date  of  this !     I  thought  it  was 


i66  WILLIAM  STANTON 

in  your  hands  weeks  ago,  and  to-day  in  cleaning  up  I 
find  it  missed  fire.  Well,  never  mind!  It's  just  as 
fresh  as  if  done  yesterday." 

Every  letter  of  the  time  is  perfectly  cheerful,  and 
shows  him  as  contented  and  interested  as  a  boy  on 
a  holiday.  He  refused  to  worry  about  anything ;  it 
was  not  his  way.  But  as  a  matter  of  fact,  he  had 
mighty  little  time  for  worrying,  even  if  he  wished 
to  do  so.  He  began  at  once  to  make  the  rounds  of 
his  enormous  "  parish  "  preaching  in  Spanish  and 
Maya,  baptizing,  administering  the  other  sacra- 
ments. From  the  very  outset,  God  blessed  his 
work.  The  people  positively  loved  him.  Within 
two  months  his  sole  name  throughout  the  District 
was  "  El  Padre  Bueno,"  the  Good  Father.  Per- 
haps most  of  the  Indians  never  knew  his  family 
name ;  his  most  official  title  being  only  "  El  Padre 
Guillermo."  We  may  close  this  chapter  with  a 
letter  to  his  aunt,  which  speaks  of  one  of  his  mJssion 
trips.  It  is  written  from  the  Cayo,  where  he  can 
never  get  paper,  on  the  back  of  a  blank  govern- 
mental form  for  marriage  certificate. 

"  The  Cayo,  January  28,  1906. 
"  My  dearest  Aunt : 

"  Please  excuse  this  letter  paper.  I  am  not  at  ray 
home,  and  have  a  chance  to  send  a  letter  from  this 


CHTRCH    AT    BENQUE   VIEJO 


THE    nil)    KESIDEXCE    AXU    THE    NEW 
liEXglE    VIE  111 


BRITISH  HONDURAS  AGAIN        167 

point  and  don't  want  to  neglect  it.  I  have  just  come 
in  here  to-day  after  a  twelve  days'  trip  in  a  dorey, 
with  two  Indian  companions,  visiting  the  scattered  por- 
tion of  my  poor  flock  along  the  wild  banks  of  the 
Belize  River.  I  have  not  had  a  chance  to  shave  in 
all  this  time,  so  you  can  imagine  my  barbaric  appear- 
ance. Add  to  this  my  already  dark  skin,  blackened  by 
exposure  to  our  sun  on  the  tropical  river,  and  you  may 
fancy  I  look  like  a  pirate.  The  nights  we  spent  in  the 
open  or  in  Indian  huts.  But  thanks  be  to  God  I  am 
as  hale  and  sound  as  ever,  and  hope  to  get  back  to 
Benque  to-morrow,  after  resting  here  to-night.  You 
know  my  house  is  only  a  short  four  hours  ride  from 
here. 

"  This  river  is  full  of  rapids,  where  we  had  to  get 
out  and  haul  the  boat  up  through  the  water.  But  I 
had  two  good  men  with  me,  and  no  serious  accident 
happened.  .  ,  . 

"  Just  got  some  mail,  your  letter  and  Mamie's 
amongst  others.     May  the  Lord  repay  you  all.  .  .  . 

"  I  enclose  another  letter,  which  has  just  come  back 
to  me.  I  wrote  it  to  you  on  November  2,  but  I  note 
from  the  envelope  that  in  my  absentmindedness  I  ad- 
dressed it  to  St.  Louis  instead  of  to  San  Antonio.  Of 
course  the  post-office  people  couldn't  find  you,  and  so 
I  get  it  back  to-day.  Well,  I'll  send  it  right  this  time, 
anyway.  .  .  . 

"  Be  sure  I  did  not  forget  you  all  on  Christmas.  It 
was  a  day  of  hard  work  for  me,  and  my  Christmas 
dinner  wouldn't  make  anyone's  mouth  water.  But  I 
was  really  happy.  I  was  doing  God's  work.  And 
when  I  sat  down,  rather  tired,  and  alone,  in  my  hut  to 
eat  my  Christmas  dinner,  I  would  not  have  exchanged 


i68  WILLIAM  STANTON 

my  lot  for  all  the  palaces  in  the  world  and  all  the  fine 
things  in  them.  .  ,  . 

"  Tell  Uncle  Lou  there  are  plenty  of  deer  down  here 
to  shoot.  I  believe  he  once  could  handle  a  rifle.  I 
saw  one  the  other  day  in  my  path  as  big  as  a  horse, 
but  of  course  that  day  I  did  not  have  my  gun  along. 
But  on  this  river  trip  I  carried  my  gun,  and  nearly 
every  day  brought  down  some  parrots  and  iguanas  — 
which  are  big,  green  lizards,  four  or  five  feet  long, 
that  lie  up  in  the  trees  overhanging  the  water,  and  are 
very  good  to  eat.  In  this  way  I  supplied  fresh  meat 
through  the  journey.  ..." 


CHAPTER  XI 

The  rains  passed  and  the  dry  season  began  in 
Benque  Viejo.  Fr.  Stanton  had  visited  most  of  the 
stations  in  his  charge,  making  great  circles  of  a  few 
weeks  at  a  time  out  from  his  home  station.  There 
is  not  a  whisper  of  complaint  from  him.  Yet  the 
work  was  extremely  hard,  and  results  slow  in  com- 
ing. The  people  liked  him,  it  is  true,  but  they  had 
difficulty  about  approaching  the  sacraments.  And 
loneliness  began  to  prey  upon  him.  For  nearly 
four  months  he  had  not  seen  a  white  man,  save  for 
the  very  occasional  meetings  with  the  District  Com- 
missioner. That  meant  more  than  one  may  realize 
to  a  companionable  man.  It  was  no  natural  en- 
thusiasm that  kept  him  up.  Indeed,  the  effort  to  be 
always  cheerful  cost  him  more  than  he  knew.  But 
it  was  a  successful  effort.  And  he  rightly  thanked 
God  for  it. 

His  house  was  to  have  been  ready  by  the  new 
year.  But  he  was  in  the  land  of  manana,  where  the 
rule  is  "  never  do  to-day  what  you  can  put  off  to  to- 
morrow."    The  new  year  came,  and  the  month  of 

169 


lyo  WILLIAM  STANTON 

January  and  half  of  February  passed,  before  his 
"  convento,"  as  the  Indians  called  it,  was  finished. 
On  the  15th  of  February  he  moved  into  it:  an  easy 
task  as  may  be  imagined.  He  slung  his  hammock, 
set  up  his  mat  bed  for  visitors,  threw  his  saddle- 
bags and  gun  in  the  corner,  rolled  the  packing  case 
to  the  middle  of  the  floor  —  and  it  was  all  done. 
He  had  bothered  very  little  about  the  house,  leaving 
the  townfolk  to  take  their  own  time  about  it.  But 
in  the  end  he  was  very  glad  it  was  ready,  and  eager 
enough  to  get  into  it,  for  he  was  to  have  a 
companion.  Another  Father  was  coming.  And 
though  he  scarcely  gave  a  thought  to  his  own  wants, 
beyond  the  most  elementary  necessities,  he  was 
anxious  to  have  everything  as  comfortable  as  might 
be  for  the  new-comer.  He  even  nailed  a  sort  of 
back-rest  to  one  of  his  boxes. 

And  he  was  not  a  day  too  soon ;  for  on  February 
1 6th  Father  Robert  Henneman  rode  up  to  his  door 
in  Benque.  Fr.  Stanton  was  jubilant.  They  were 
old  friends ;  Fr.  Henneman  was  a  stalwart  worker, 
a  genial  companion,  a  lively,  hustling  man.  They 
cooked  a  meal  between  them,  and  ate,  and  smoked 
and  laughed  and  planned  until  the  dawn  was  flush- 
ing the  east,  and  boasted  about  their  fine  quarters, 
and  fought  generously  over  who  should  have  the 


BENQUE  VIEJO  171 

bed.  And  when  finally  Fr.  Stanton  climbed  into 
his  hammock,  and  pulled  his  "  four  foot  square  " 
blanket  about  him,  he  was  the  happiest  man  in  the 
Cayo  District.  Everything  was  going  to  go  splen- 
didly now.  They  would  divide  the  work  between 
them,  and  there  would  always  be  some  one  at  home 
to  look  after  the  people  of  Benque  and  answer  the 
emergency  sick-calls  in  the  District.  Of  course,  it 
hadn't  been  really  hard  before,  but  it  would  be  a 
"  circus  "  now.  But  Fr.  Henneman  noted  how  the 
long  isolation  from  his  own  kind  had  played  on  his 
nerves ;  he  had  been  living  on  his  capital. 

Fr.  Stanton  remained  in  Benque  a  short  time,  to 
help  his  companion  to  get  used  to  the  people  and 
their  ways,  before  starting  out  to  visit  his  stations. 
His  stay  was  prolonged  until  the  end  of  the  month 
by  an  accident.  Whilst  chopping  wood  for  their 
breakfast  one  morning,  just  after  his  Mass,  he 
chopped  off  part  of  a  finger  on  his  right  hand.  He 
made  no  fuss  about  it,  and  bandaged  it  up  with  a 
bit  of  cloth.  But  a  little  Indian  who  had  seen  the 
accident  ran  into  the  church  and  called  Fr.  Henne- 
man, who  hurriedly  put  some  carbolic  acid  on  the 
wound.  It  burned  him  fearfully,  but  he  pooh- 
poohed  the  whole  thing;  and  eventually  the  finger 
healed  up.     In  a  few  days  more  he  set  out  on  his 


172  WILLIAM  STANTON 

rounds  of  the  villages.  Passing  through  the  Cayo, 
he  hastily  took  the  chance  of  writing  to  the  English 
scholastic  who  had  been  his  companion  part  of  the 
time  in  Manila. 

"  The  Cayo,  March  5,  1906. 
"  My  dear  Mr.  Brown :  P.  C. 

"  I  have  just  received  your  thrice  welcome  letter  to- 
day when  I  came  into  the  Cayo,  and  don't  want  to  let 
the  chance  pass  to  answer  at  once,  as  a  pitpan  will  soon 
leave  here  for  Belize  and  this  letter  must  catch  it. 
Excuse  haste,  paper  (no  other  at  hand  here),  and 
everything.  Moreover,  if  my  penmanship  is  worse 
than  usual  (supposing  such  a  thing  possible!),  it  is 
because  I  am  writing  under  difficulties,  having  man- 
aged to  chop  off  with  a  hatchet,  three  days  ago,  the 
first  joint  of  third  finger  of  right  hand,  when  trying 
to  gather  wood  to  cook  breakfast.  It  is  beginning  to 
heal  up  all  right,  and  I  can  use,  as  you  see,  the  remain- 
ing fingers  pretty  well. 

"  I  have  been  four  months  alone  with  my  Indians  — 
with  forty  pueblos  to  look  after.  I  have  managed  al- 
ready to  visit  thirty  of  these  stations,  taken  the  census 
of  every  house,  and  started  work  in  some  of  the  more 
accessible  villages.  Talk  about  spiritual  abandonment ! 
Just  think,  I  was  the  only  priest  in  a  region  fully  as 
large  as  Luzon  (Cayo  District  and  Peten  in  Guate- 
mala), populated  by  Maya  and  Lacandon  Indians,  with 
a  sprinkling  of  Caribs  and  Creoles  along  the  Belize 
River.     So  you  see  I  don't  have  to  look  for  work.  .  .  . 

"  Entomological  work  under  the  circumstances  in 
Manila  was  certainly  sweet  to  the  natural  man,  and  I 
may  as  well  confess  to  a  very  strong  temptation  to 


BENQUE  VIEJO  173 

return.  But  during  the  tertianship  I  had  time  to  weigh 
cahnly  both  sides  in  the  balance.  I  could  not  in  con- 
science do  otherwise  than  present  my  case  to  superiors, 
telling  them  my  preference,  but  at  the  same  time  asking 
them  finally  to  decide  for  me.  And  so  here  I  am, 
buried  in  these  inaccessible  forests  and  swamps,  but 
perfectly  happy,  and  with  a  feeling  of  entire  security 
that  it  is  the  Lord's  work  I  am  at  and  no  self-seeking. 
There  is  little  danger  of  vanity  here,  as  from  the  bird's- 
eye  view  I  have  taken  of  the  situation,  the  work 
humanly  speaking  must  be  extremely  slow  of  results 
and  the  fruit  reaped  years  after  —  when  I  am  paying 
my  debt  in  purgatory.  .  .  . 

"  Though,  as  you  may  imagine,  I  am  pretty  much  on 
the  go,  I  have  found  time  to  start  a  garden  (all  my  own 
labour,  of  course)  with  seeds  sent  me  from  the  States, 
and  have  already  the  ordinary  vegetables  coming  up 
nicely.  I  am  also  starting  to  plant  the  tropical  fruits, 
etc.     And  now  that  I  am  writing,  I  wish  to  beg  you  or 

Fr.  S to  send  me  seeds  from  Manila,  especially 

ilang-ilang ,  native  and  Chinese,  champaca,  betel-nut, 
cinnamon,  native  and  Indian,  stercularia,  and  any  other 
PhiHppine  or  East  Indian  fruits  or  flowers  —  not  for- 
getting the  diminutive  orange  (red  when  ripe,  and  as 
big  as  a  cherry)  common  in  the  garden.  I  have  al- 
ready growing,   coffee,   cacao,   avocado,   anonas,   etc. 

Shall  send  Fr.  S the  vanilla,  which  I  have  also ;  it 

is  common  in  the  woods,  but  does  not  fruit  at  this  time 
of  year.     Hope  to  write  to  him  when  I  get  time. 

"  Bugs  ?  Yes,  millions,  but  no  time  to  consider  them 
scientifically  yet  —  hymcnoptcra  too,  terrible  pests 
amongst  Formicidse  —  had  to  fight  Atta  lebasi,  one  of 
the  '  parasol  ants,'  three  nights  in  succession  to  prevent 


174  WILLIAM  STANTON 

them  from  running  off  with  a  whole  barrel  of  corn 
inside  my  house.  Ticks  and  fleas  —  covered  with  them 
every  day  —  whole  body  like  small-pox  patient  from 
ticks.  Within  last  two  days  had  thirty-seven  '  jiggers  ' 
extracted  from  my  feet.  This  tropical  American  bur- 
rowing tick  is  certainly  a  caution !  Even  one  is  enough 
for  an  experience,  but  this  last  dose  of  thirty-seven 
has  left  my  feet  as  if  I  had  put  them  up  as  a  target  for 
a  dozen  loads  of  bird-shot.  The  holes  are  still  raw 
and  bleeding,  but  I  hope  to  be  back  at  Benque  soon, 
when  I  shall  dose  them  with  oil  and  prepare  them  for 
another  go.  I  have  only  been  stung  once  by  a  scorpion 
whilst  here.  So  you  see  I  haven't  lost  my  love  for 
the  bugs,  nor  they  theirs  for  me.  But  before  the  end 
I'll  get  after  them  with  my  cyanide  bottle  if  they  don't 
look  out. 

"  Bravo !  Bravo !  old  man,  I  told  you  there  was  a 
mine  to  be  found  in  the  Philippine  hymenoptera. 
Keep  it  up,  and  keep  me  posted  of  all  your  successes. 
I  shall  send  you  my  notes  on  the  order  as  soon  as  I 
have  time  to  unpack  them  and  get  them  off.  ...  I 
hope  I  shall  be  able  to  help  you  with  some  specimens 
from  this  part  of  the  world  after  a  while,  when  I  shall 
have  settled  down. 

"  A  thousand  thanks   for  all  the  news   about  the 

brethren  in  Manila.     Good  old  C !     How  I  should 

enjoy  another  glimpse  of  his  ascetic  mug!  Tell  him 
I  offer  him  the  ministership  of  the  Benque  residence, 
which  is  a  tempting  offer  for  a  minister,  as  the  meat 
bill  will  not  be  large.  The  Benque  community  hasn't 
seen  fresh  meat  for  over  six  weeks.  Assure  him  that 
the  '  majadero '  who  perfumed  the  retired  corner  of 
the  *  cementerio  de  Calixto '  with  his  pipe  instead  of 


BENQUE  VIEJO  175 

with  his  virtues,  is  trying  his  best  to  hold  aloft  '  la 
cruz,  la  cruz '  amongst  the  poor  benighted  Mayas  of 
the  Mopan,  but  that  he  feels  lonesome  for  the  '  alioli ' ! 
"  Wish  I  had  time  to  write  more.  Any  way,  my 
crippled  hand  is  getting  tired.  Salute  in  my  name 
all  the  good  fathers,  scholastics,  and  brothers  in 
Manila.  .  .  ." 

His  Cayo  stationery  was  always  weird;  this  last 
was  written  on  a  bit  of  wrapping  paper,  that  had 
come  about  a  magazine.  He  had  to  write  as  occa- 
sion offered,  and  could  not  carry  paper  about  with 
him.  Besides,  he  was  forever  losing  such  things  as 
he  did  carry. 

His  garden  was  a  delight  to  him,  and  a  source  of 
marvel  to  the  Indians.  His  aunt  and  sister  kept 
him  supplied  with  seeds  and  added  implements  as 
he  needed  them.  Indeed  they  were  his  chief  sup- 
port in  every  way,  particularly  in  the  beginning. 
The  Indians  were  poor,  and  could  contribute  little 
or  nothing,  nor  were  they  always  ready  to  do  even 
the  little  they  could.  Fr.  Henneman  narrates  a 
typical  instance;  of  which,  however,  Fr.  Stanton 
would  not  make  mention  in  his  letters;  he  always 
spoke  most  kindly  of  his  Indians,  and  was  almost 
too  generous  in  finding  excuses  for  them. 

"  Succotz  has  a  church  dedicated  to  St.  Joseph, 
and  the  people  wished  a  novena  preparatory  to  the 


176  WILLIAM  STANTON 

feast,  in  March,  1906.  Fr.  Stanton  was  to  say 
Mass  every  day  at  the  village.  We  had  no  corn, 
and  the  Succotzianos  had  hundreds  of  bushels, 
w^hich  they  were  holding  to  boost  the  price  (high 
finance  in  the  bush!).  Fr.  Stanton  asked  them  to 
sell  him  some.  He  explained  the  case  to  the  Al- 
calde, and  insisted  on  three  sacks  of  corn.  Only 
one  was  brought,  and  when  the  other  two  were  not 
forthcoming,  Fr.  Stanton  refused  to  continue  the 
novena.  He  had  forbidden  the  usual  procession 
with  a  boar's  head,  before  which  they  burned 
candles  and  incense  and  prayed  —  a  relic  of  pagan- 
ism. When  he  did  not  come  for  Mass,  the  Suc- 
cotzianos determined  they  would  have  their  proces- 
sion. The  hog  was  killed,  the  biggest  and  fattest 
for  many  years ;  but  when  he  was  cut  open,  he  was 
found  —  to  the  dismay  of  the  rebels  —  to  be  swarm- 
ing with  worms.  Then  of  course  their  superstition 
took  another  turn  —  *  The  curse  of  God ! '  they  all 
cried  out,  and  were  ready  to  give  in  to  the  Padre. 
And,  as  Fr.  Stanton  remarked,  it  was  St.  Patrick's 
Day  in  the  Morning,  March  17.  But  in  the  mean- 
time, the  Succotzianos  had  sent  a  deputation  to  the 
District  Commissioner,  beseeching  him  to  force  Fr. 
Stanton  to  continue  the  novena.  Of  course  he  told 
them   that  the   Government   couldn't   interfere  in 


BENQUE  VIEJO  177 

Church  affairs,  and  added  that,  if  they  wanted  his 
private  opinion,  it  was :  '  Si  no  hay  mais,  no  hay 
misa  ' —  no  corn,  no  Mass !  and  they  ought  to  be 
ashamed  of  their  conduct." 

With  such  children  as  these  one  could  not  be 
angry;  certainly  Fr.  Stanton  never  was.  Even 
when  he  disciplined  them,  as  he  had  to  do  from  time 
to  time,  he  was  chuckling  to  himself.  Only  once 
or  twice  did  he  let  his  temper  show,  and  then  he  was 
rather  terrifying.  The  poor  Indians  went  about 
awed,  astounded  over  the  incomprehensible  change 
in  "  El  Padre  Bueno."  They  attributed  it  to  the 
sun.  He  was  infinitely  patient  with  them,  though 
he  kept  a  firm  hand  too.  He  had  a  sort  of  dis- 
tinction between  his  personal  patience  and  his 
severer  official  stand.  In  private,  though  he  coaxed 
and  pleaded  with,  he  never  snubbed  those  who  were 
living  in  concubinage  —  the  curse  of  the  Colony. 
But  as  the  first  Holy  Week  drew  on  —  to  quote  Fr. 
Henneman : 

"  We  announced  on  the  two  Sundays  preceding 
that  none  but  good  Christians  could  march  in  the 
Palm  Sunday  procession.  Fr.  Stanton  was  dra- 
matic in  his  denunciation  of  '  amancebados  y  con- 
cubinas.'  It  was  a  terrible  blow  to  these  people, 
who  do  love  a  procession. 


178  WILLIAM  STANTON 

"  Then  came  the  day  itself.  Fr.  Stanton  offered 
to  be  celebrant,  so  that  Fr.  Henneman,  whom  the 
Indians  called  '  el  Padre  bravo,'  the  violent  Father, 
could  manage  the  mob.  It  was  clearly  explained 
that  all  should  march  two  and  two.  The  children 
had  been  drilled  for  weeks,  but  it  was  impossible  to 
get  the  women  into  any  sort  of  order.  Fr.  H. 
shouted  himself  hoarse  —  'Dos  y  dos!  Two  and 
two ! ' —  but  there  they  stood,  ten  here,  four  there. 
Suddenly  Father  H.  noticed  that  they  were  hold- 
ing hands  in  pairs,  clinging  to  one  another  with  a 
death  grip  —  in  pairs,  but  not  in  file.  He  rushed 
into  the  church  to  Fr.  Stanton :  *  Tell  me  how  to 
say,  march  two  and  two  in  ranks  —  or  I'll  burst! ' 
To  prevent  the  catastrophe,  Fr.  Stanton  grinningly 
told  him.  Out  rushed  Fr.  H.  With  much  shout- 
ing, shoving,  frowning,  the  procession  got  into 
line  —  they  marched  like  grenadiers,  Fr.  H.  pass- 
ing up  and  down  along  the  line  to  keep  it  in  order. 
Fr.  Stanton  said  he  could  tell  where  Fr.  H.  was  at 
any  moment  —  as  at  that  point  there  was  a  wild 
swerving,  not  to  get  too  near  to  the  Grand  Marshal. 

"  The  amancebados  hid  in  their  houses,  and  the 
women  wept  bitter  tears  because  they  could  not  take 
part  in  the  '  beautiful '  procession ;  and  after  Easter 


BENQUE  VIEJO  179 

the  proclamation  of  marriage  banns  swelled  to  a  re- 
markable number." 

He  was  very  practical  in  his  plans  and  methods. 
He  studied  the  character  and  ways  of  his  Indians 
unobtrusively,  but  keenly ;  learned  what  motives  ap- 
pealed to  them,  what  were  their  prejudices,  their 
superstitions,  their  local  customs,  religious,  social, 
civil.  It  was  slow  work.  The  Maya  Indian  is  a 
simple,  quiet,  inoffensive  person  (except,  of  course, 
when  drunk  —  which  he  frequently  is)  ;  but  he  is 
naturally  reserved,  and  inclined  to  be  suspicious  of 
white  men.  He  talks  little  at  any  time,  but  he 
closes  up  like  a  clam  in  the  face  of  inquiries  which 
he  even  suspects  of  bearing  upon  his  tribal  customs 
or  beliefs.  It  is  no  little  tribute  to  Fr.  Stanton's 
character,  and  to  his  cleverness  too,  that  in  a  few 
years  he  really  knew  his  people.  Of  course,  his 
comparative  familiarity  with  their  language  aided 
him  a  great  deal  in  this.  But  ultimately  he 
succeeded  because  he  made  them  his  friends.  They 
are  ordinarily  a  most  undemonstrative  people;  and 
it  was  a  matter  of  wonderment  to  observers  to  see 
them  rush  out  in  delight  to  meet  him.  There  is 
scarcely  need  to  say  that  the  children  simply  dogged 
his  steps. 


i8o  WILLIAM  STANTON 

He  wished  very  much  to  teach  them  habits  of  in- 
dustry; a  thing  for  which  the  Indian  has  no  love. 
His  garden  was  begun  with  that  purpose  in  view, 
quite  as  much  as  for  its  obvious  need  in  his  own 
Hving.  He  wanted  to  rouse  their  curiosity  in  the 
matter,  as  a  step  toward  getting  them  to  take  up  a 
similar  activity.  The  first  part  of  the  program  was 
a  brilliant  success.  They  never  wearied  of  watch- 
ing him  work  —  and  the}''  never  offered  to  help  him ; 
perhaps  they  were  chary  of  depriving  him  of  any  of 
the  pleasure  he  seemed  to  take  in  such  a  strange  oc- 
cupation. After  a  while  he  got  some  of  the  boys 
interested,  gave  them  seeds,  and  started  them  at 
cultivating  small  patches.  Then  the  women,  who 
had  to  do  what  field-work  there  was  in  any  case, 
began  to  make  little  gardens.  He  encouraged  them 
all,  and  meanwhile  kept  on  with  the  good  example 
in  his  own  garden.  But  they  advanced  very  slowly 
in  their  imitation.  They  made  little  spurts  of  a 
few  days  work,  and  then  rested  whilst  the  jungle 
crept  swiftly  back  upon  their  gardens.  A  woman 
who  was  admiring  the  trim  cleanness  of  his  plots, 
asked  him  one  day  to  what  saint  he  prayed,  that 
his  garden  should  be  so  free  from  weeds.  "  Oh, 
a  very  powerful  saint,"  he  laughed.  "  El  Santo 
Trabajo !  —  Saint  Hard  Work !  "     And  the  woman 


BENQUE  VIEJO  i8i 

assured  him  solemnly  that  she  had  never  heard  of 
such  a  saint.  Certainly,  outside  of  the  mission- 
aries' house  there  was  no  shrine  to  him  in  Benque 
Vie  jo. 

After  a  few  months,  his  garden  quite  supplied  his 
table.  More  and  more  contributions  came  in  from 
relatives  and  friends  in  the  States.  The  church 
was  fairly  well  equipped.  He  began  to  get  books. 
He  even  got  a  real  stove,  though  he  could  get  no 
one  to  cook  on  it.  They  had  never  seen  such  a 
thing.  When  some  one  sent  him  a  little  piece  of 
carpet,  which  he  put  in  the  center  of  their  clay  floor, 
his  Indian  visitors  almost  endangered  his  walls  in 
their  efforts  to  avoid  treading  on  the  beautiful  thing 
on  the  floor. 

Writing  to  his  sister,  on  March  26,  to  thank  her 
for  her  latest  gifts,  he  says : 

"  I  have  just  got  out  of  the  saddle  after  a  hard  three 
days'  trip,  but  cannot  go  to  bed  without  at  least  ac- 
knowledging your  loving  remembrances  —  as  I  hope  to 
be  able  to  send  off  some  mail  to-morrow  to  the 
Cayo.  .  .  . 

"  I  came  down  into  these  almost  inaccessible  wilds 
with  absolutely  nothing  but  a  strong  reliance  on 
Providence.  But  now,  little  by  little,  Fr.  Henneman 
and  I  are  receiving  from  friends  many  of  the  more 
necessary  things  for  our  churches  and  our  work.  Of 
course  we  must  depend  this  way  upon  charity,  because 


1 82  WILLIAM  STANTON 

our  poor  ignorant  and  abandoned  Indians  are  miserably 
poor  as  a  rule,  living  on  corn  and  chile  and  occasional 
game,  and  it  will  necessarily  be  years  before  they  will 
be  able  to  support  their  own  churches  and  provide  them 
with  the  equipment  needed.  But  it  is  God's  work,  and 
He  will  provide  in  one  way  or  another. 

"  My  maimed  finger  is  getting  along  well,  but  slowly ; 
and  you  see  it  does  not  hinder  me  from  using  a  pen, 
though  as  yet  I  cannot  use  that  hand  for  other  work. 
My  old  left  hand  comes  in  mighty  nicely  now,  and  with 
my  machete  in  this  hand  I  can  do  more  in  my  garden 
than  any  Indian  around  here  can  do  with  both 
hands.  .  .  ." 

But  he  had  not  much  time  to  enjoy  what  he  called 
the  "  luxuries  of  Benque."  It  would  be  a  conserva- 
tive estimate  to  say  that  he  spent  one  third  of  his 
time  in  the  saddle  or  in  canoe,  visiting  his  pueblos. 
His  suberb  physical  constitution  enabled  him  to  go 
through  with  work  and  endure  privation  which 
would  have  soon  killed  another  man.  He  gave  no 
thought  to  his  fatigue,  and  never  spared  himself. 
There  was  so  much  to  be  done,  and  he  was  im- 
patient to  be  about  it.  But  withal,  he  was  never 
a  fussy  worker,  he  had  no  nervous  haste ;  but 
steadily,  cheerfully,  with  persistent  energy  and  zeal, 
he  went  about,  exhorting,  encouraging,  coaxing,  ad- 
vising his  people,  and  administering  the  sacraments. 
He  knew  he  was  strong,  and  he  taxed  his  strength 


BENQUE  VIEJO  183 

to  the  utmost.  There  was  no  pose  in  his  making 
Hght  of  discomforts  and  weariness;  that  was 
his  honest  way  of  looking  at  them.  On  June  4, 
1906,  he  wrote  home : 

"...  I  have  just  returned  from  a  river  trip,  after 
being  away  from  home  thirty-one  days,  moving  about 
from  place  to  place  amongst  my  scattered  people  on 
the  river  banks  and  in  the  bush.  Thanks  be  to  God, 
I  got  back  safe,  to  the  relief  of  Fr.  Henneman,  who 
had  not  been  able  to  hear  from  me  during  these  days, 

"  My  health  was  good  until  the  last  week,  when  I 
got  a  little  stroke  from  the  heat,  followed  by  several 
days'  fever,  which  put  me  on  my  back  for  four  days ; 
but  I  am  now  myself  again.  Fortunately,  I  was  get- 
ting near  my  journey's  end  when  I  got  the  little  attack, 
and  as  soon  as  I  was  able  to  get  up,  I  left  the  Indian 
hut  where  I  had  been  lying,  and  with  the  help  of  my 
two  faithful  Indian  companions  arrived  safely  in 
Benque,  after  three  more  days'  travelling.  I  am  all 
right  now,  the  fever  is  gone,  my  finger  is  healed  com- 
pletely, though  the  joint  remains  stiff  and  a  little 
crooked.  .  .  . 

"  Excuse  my  haste  and  brevity  to-day,  as  I  have  a 
thousand  things  to  attend  to  that  have  accumulated 
during  my  absence  from  home.  But  I  wanted  at  least 
to  send  you  a  word,  to  let  you  know  the  Lord  brought 
me  back  safe  —  though  you  would  have  to  look  twice 
to  make  sure  of  me  now,  with  my  black  beard.  Travel- 
ling about  almost  continually  in  the  bush,  I  have  so 
little  chance  to  shave  that  I  have  finally  given  up  and 
begun  to  let  my  beard  grow. 


i84  WILLIAM  STANTON 

"  Don't  forget  my  mission  in  your  prayers.  Love  to 
all,  especially  the  little  ones.     In  haste.  ,  ,  ." 

One  would  never  guess  from  this  letter  that  it 
was  written  by  a  man  still  very  sick,  and  that  the 
last  "  three  more  days'  travelling  "  so  casually  men- 
tioned had  been  three  days  of  torture,  when  his 
Indians  doubted  if  they  should  get  him  to  Benque 
at  all.  His  companion  was  shocked  at  his  haggard 
appearance  when  he  reached  Benque,  and  wanted 
him  to  go  to  bed ;  but  he  laughingly  pitched  in  at  his 
correspondence  instead,  and  said  bed  could  w^ait  a 
while.  He  did  rest  for  a  few  days,  and  with  his 
wonderful  recuperative  power  was  really  himself 
again  in  a  short  time. 

At  home  he  slept  little.  He  worked  until  mid- 
night at  his  letters,  or  at  entomological  work  or  his 
notes  on  the  fauna  of  the  Colony.  He  was  up 
again  at  five  in  the  morning,  ran  down  to  the  river 
for  a  plunge,  then  went  to  the  church  for  his  medita- 
tion and  Mass.  He  usually  worked  several  hours  a 
day,  in  the  broiling  sun,  in  his  garden.  Any  old 
sort  of  food  satisfied  him,  and  he  was  very  ab- 
stemious in  the  matter  of  drink.  He  smoked  a  pipe 
almost  incessantly,  using  the  raw,  sun-cured  native 
tobacco,  which  was  remarkably  strong. 

He  had  never  worried  in  the  least  about  money 


BENQUE  VIEJO  185 

matters  or  his  ways  and  means  of  living,  partly 
from  a  simple  faith  and  trust  in  God,  but  partly 
from  a  large,  smiling  incapacity  for  the  minutiae  of 
business  affairs.  He  was  a  sort  of  superior  at 
Benque,  and  was  supposed  to  bear  the  responsibility 
of  managing  the  place  and  its  dependent  stations. 
The  Bishop,  in  the  beginning,  had  made  the  people 
promise  to  pay  their  Padre  something  like  twelve  or 
fifteen  dollars  a  month  for  his  support.  Fr. 
Stanton  rarely  got  the  money,  hardly  ever  knew 
whether  or  not  he  had  got  it,  and  usually  gave  it 
away  to  the  poorer  people  of  the  village  when  he 
did  get  it.  Any  sort  of  accounts  were  an  annoy- 
ance and  something  of  a  puzzle  to  him. 

Fr.  Henneman  gives  some  instances  of  his  busi- 
ness methods: 

"  On  his  first  trip  around  the  pueblos,  after  I 
joined  him,  his  expenditures  far  exceeded  his  in- 
come from  the  alms  of  the  people.  I  ventured  to 
remark  that  we  could  not  well  live  that  way.  When 
he  came  home  from  the  next  trip,  he  triumphantly 
proclaimed  that  he  was  ahead  this  time.  He 
brought  out  his  memoranda,  and  began  to  figure  out 
his  receipts  and  expenses.  After  an  hour  or  so,  I 
found  him  still  at  it,  and  asked,  *  What  is  the 
trouble?' 


i86  WILLIAM  STANTON 

"  *  Why,  I  think  I  have  it  now.  I  say,  I  believe 
I'm  two  dollars  richer  than  when  I  left  home!  But 
it  doesn't  seem  quite  right.' 

"  He  read  out  his  items,  and  I  took  them  down. 
We  found  out  that  his  expenses  again  exceeded  his 
receipts. 

"  '  Well,  now,  that's  queer ! '  he  said. 

"  He  rummaged  around  in  his  saddle  bags  a 
while,  came  back,  and  laid  some  money  on  the  table. 

"  '  But  your  accounts  show  you  have  a  deficit  of 
three  dollars  and  some  cents ! '  I  exclaimed.  '  Did 
you  pay  the  men  ?  ' 

"'Why,  of  course!' 

"  '  And  your  bills  for  suppHes?  ' 

"  '  Every  one ;  there's  nothing  due ;  that  I'm  sure 
of.' 

"  I  counted  the  money ;  nearly  five  dollars. 

"'There  you  are  now!'  he  shouted  gleefully. 
*  Didn't  I  tell  you  I  came  out  ahead  this  time ! '  " 


CHAPTER  XII 

It  is  almost  impossible,  even  by  multiplied  in- 
cidents, to  give  anything  like  an  adequate  idea  of 
what  his  work  was  in  the  mission,  of  the  constant 
hardships  of  that  work,  of  its  weary  monotony. 
Fr.  Stanton  had  always  about  him  a  touch  of  boy- 
ish romance.  His  imagination  thrilled  to  the 
thought  of  the  tangled  woods,  the  great,  rich 
silences  of  the  tropics.  He  had  a  boy's  delight  in 
riding,  in  carrying  weapons.  We  may  fancy  that 
during  the  years  he  was  away  from  British  Hon- 
duras these  strands  too  were  woven  into  the  cords 
that  drew  him  back.  They  were  decidedly  the 
lesser  part  of  the  attraction,  but  they  were  a  part. 
He  loved  the  open;  he  loved  to  think  of  himself  in 
the  dark  forests,  machete  in  hand,  hacking  his  way 
through  the  matted  bush,  or  swimming  his  horse 
across  rivers  or  swinging  a  paddle  in  his  canoe 
through  the  soft  night;  he  could  shut  his  eyes  and 
see  the  moonlight  on  the  river.  But  those  dreams 
chilled  swiftly  in  the  face  of  reality.  One  ride 
through  the  bush  may  be  a  pleasant  memory ;  a  score 

187 


i88  WILLIAM  STANTON 

of  them,  a  hundred  of  them,  become  a  nightmare. 
There  may  be  exultation  in  the  thought  of  dropping 
down  the  smooth  river  in  a  httle  dorey,  with  a  gun 
at  one's  feet,  and  a  quick  eye  for  a  toucan  or  iguana 
in  the  sweeping  branches  overhead.  But  there  is 
only  a  world  of  weariness  in  body  and  soul,  when 
day  after  day  at  the  paddle  has  blistered  one's 
hands,  and  the  sun  beats  mercilessly  down,  and  the 
glare  on  the  river  is  blinding,  and  the  chance  of 
game  to  be  shot  has  become  only  the  dull  question 
of  whether  or  not  one  eats  that  day.  Well,  all  work 
is  monotonous;  for  all  of  us  the  glamour  of  the 
future  slides  imperceptibly  into  the  dreary  round 
of  the  present.  Whatever  natural  charm  the  mis- 
sion had  for  him  was  soon  lost ;  there  remained  only 
its  unrelenting  toil,  its  loneliness,  its  endless  struggle 
against  the  apathy  and  stupidity  of  his  Indians,  its 
privations,  its  weariness. 

His  particular  field  was  rather  easily  the  hard- 
est in  the  mission.  Its  material  conditions  were 
the  worst,  its  people  the  rudest,  its  extent  the  great- 
est. There  were  so  many  stations  to  be  visited 
that,  even  though  he  had  a  companion  in  his  district, 
they  were  seldom  together ;  he  was  constantly  on  the 
road,  alone.  In  the  beginning,  he  usually  had  a 
guide  with  him.     Later,  as  he  got  to  know  the 


EL  PADRE    BUENO  189 

country  better,  he  went  alone,  or  at  most  had  some 
boy  along  for  company.  He  dreaded  loneliness, 
though  it  was  most  often  his  portion;  for  his  Indian 
companion  was  always  taciturn. 

Very  frequently  he  lost  his  way,  even  after  he 
had  spent  years  in  the  district.  He  rode  often  by 
compass.  The  trails  were  obscure,  hard  to  find, 
hard  to  follow.  Even  the  natives  lose  their  way  in 
those  woods,  where  the  faint  paths,  if  untravelled 
for  a  few  weeks,  become  so  overgrown  with  bush 
as  to  be  blotted  out  completely.  He  made  little  of 
having  to  dismount  and  walk  ahead  of  his  horse, 
to  chop  a  path  through  the  bush  for  himself  and  his 
beast.  Often  he  passed  the  night  in  the  forest, 
sleeping  on  the  ground,  with  his  saddle-bags  for 
pillow.  He  admitted  that,  the  first  few  times,  he 
shared  the  Indians'  dread  of  the  "  tigers,"  as  they 
call  the  jaguars,  which  might  come  upon  them  as 
they  slept.  And,  in  the  weariness  of  the  actual,  he 
so  far  forgot  his  boyish  romance  as  to  leave  his 
rifle  behind  him  half  the  time.  But,  as  he  said, 
"  God  was  there  too,"  and  no  harm  ever  came  to 
him. 

It  might  be  wearying  to  quote  his  letters  of  this 
time  consistently.  There  is  a  good  deal  of  same- 
ness in  them,   the  record  of  a  rather  unvarying 


I90  WILLIAM  STANTON 

round  of  work.     But  we  shall  give  some  extracts, 

to  show  roughly  a  few  details  of  that  work.     They 

are  almost  entirely  from  letters  to  his  sister  and 

aunt. 

"  Benque  Vie  jo,  Nov.  13,  1906. 

"  I  have  been  so  busy  the  last  few  weeks  that  I  have 
not  had  time  even  to  think  of  writing  to  any  one.  It 
is  near  midnight  now,  but  there  is  a  chance  to  get  a 
letter  down  to  Belize  to-morrow.  .  .  . 

"  I  have  been  alone  the  past  month.  Fr.  Henneman 
having  gone  to  Belize  for  his  annual  retreat.  In  the 
meantime  I  am  not  only  pastor  but  school-teacher  as 
well,  as  I  have  been  obliged  to  dismiss  the  Carib  teacher 
I  had  for  his  misconduct,  and  have  to  carry  on  the 

Indian  school  we  have  here,  until  Fr.  H brings 

another  teacher.  The  devil  is  working  very  hard 
against  us  here  amongst  these  poor  creatures,  and  we 
have  to  fight  a  hard  battle,  but  God  will  win  out  in  the 
end.  .  .  . 

"  Here  in  Benque  there  are  only  two  men  who  under- 
stand a  little  English,  and  one  who  can  speak  a  few 
words  of  it.  Everything  is  in  Spanish  or  Maya  —  in 
most  of  the  villages  only  Maya." 

"  Jan.  16,  1907. 

".  .  .  Here  we  are  not  only  priests,  we  are  the  doc- 
tors, and  the  carpenters,  gardeners,  fence-builders, 
ditch-diggers,  cooks,  hostlers,  saddlers,  and  everything 
else.  We  are  beginning  to  get  our  place  into  some  sort 
of  shape  —  except  our  mud  house,  which  will  keep  fall- 
ing down  in  the  rain.  My  vegetable  garden  especially 
is  the  wonder  of  the  country  round  about. 

"  I  have  not  been  away  from  home,  except  on  sick 


EL  PADRE     BUENO  191 

calls,  for  five  weeks  now,  but  to-day  I  start  out  again." 

"  Mar.  5,  1907. 

"  Fr.  Henneman  went  down  to  Belize  last  week,  to 
give  a  Lenten  mission  there,  so  I  am  alone  again  for 
another  five  or  six  weeks. 

".  .  .  We  have  been  gradually  fixing  up  things  about 
our  shack,  and  have  now  a  real,  civilized  stove,  with  an 
oven,  under  a  little  shelter  just  outside  our  house. 
The  natives  don't  know  what  to  make  of  the  strange 
thing,  and  come  from  miles  around  to  look  at  it,  and 
will  not  believe  that  that  funny  affair  can  cook  things. 
We  have  a  Carib  boy  whom  we  are  training  to  cook, 
though  as  yet  we  do  most  of  the  practising  at  it  our- 
selves. 

"  I  should  like  if  you  or  Mamie  would  write  out  a 
full  set  of  directions  how  to  make  the  good  old  home- 
made bread,  the  proportions  of  everything  used,  and 
how  to  get  it  to  raise,  etc. —  also  for  pancakes.  .  .  . 

"  Excuse  my  haste,  but  I  am  really  tired  and  have 
not  yet  finished  my  Breviary,  and  must  do  it  before 
midnight." 

"  Belize,  May  16,  1907. 

"  Just  a  line  before  I  get  back  into  the  bush.  After 
a  long  spell  in  the  bush,  visiting  various  scattered 
native  settlements,  I  got  within  a  day's  ride  of  Belize. 
So  I  have  run  in  to  rest  my  horse  for  a  day  or  two, 
and  have  the  pleasure  of  seeing  the  Fathers  here. 

"  To-morrow  morning  I  am  off  again  for  the  wilds, 
and  expect  to  reach  home,  that  is,  Benque  Viejo,  along 
in  the  beginning  of  June.  This  year  I  am  doing  my 
rounds  on  horseback  entirely.  In  my  saddle-bags  I 
carry  all  the  necessaries  for  Mass,  and  a  change  of 


192  WILLIAM  STANTON 

clothes,  and  trust  to  Providence  for  the  rest.  ...  I 
have  been  very  fortunate  this  trip  so  far,  and  have  not 
been  obhged  to  sleep  in  the  jungle  a  single  night, 
though  I  came  mighty  near  doing  so  one  night. 

"  I  am  getting  pretty  well  acquainted  with  my  dis- 
trict by  this  time,  and  can  usually  make  my  way  with- 
out the  trouble  of  guides,  who  often  give  great  bother 
and  delay.  I  go  from  village  to  village,  staying  such 
time  as  may  be  necessary,  to  instruct  the  natives,  ad- 
minister the  sacraments,  and  do  what  I  can  for  them. 
I  carry  my  hammock  with  me  —  usually  would  have 
no  place  to  sleep  otherwise,  as  their  huts  are  so  poor, 
crowded,  and  filthy.  But  the  grace  of  God  is  begin- 
ning to  work  in  the  souls  of  some  of  my  flock,  and  the 
journey,  though  full  of  material  inconveniences,  is  full 
also  of  spiritual  consolation  for  me." 

"  Belize,  May  26,  1907. 

"  Here  I  am  still.  ...  I  was  about  to  start  up  coun- 
try last  week,  as  I  planned,  but  on  getting  up  in  the 
morning  of  the  day  fixed  upon  I  found  to  my  surprise 
I  was  a  Httle  out  of  sorts.  I  tried  to  say  Mass,  but 
had  to  leave  the  altar  without  doing  so  —  found  I  had 
chills,  fever,  and  a  badly  inflamed  leg.  The  doctor 
was  called,  and  he  ordered  me  to  bed  —  said  the  fever 
was  caused  by  the  leg,  and  the  bad  leg  caused  by  riding. 
I  had  been  a  good  many  days  in  the  saddle  since  I  left 
Benque,  but  was  apparently  as  good  as  new,  till  this 
thing  came  on  suddenly,  all  in  one  night,  it  seems. 

"  Thanks  to  the  Lord  and  the  doctor's  skillful  treat- 
ment, everything  is  all  right  again,  and  I  am  off  in  the 
morning.  It  will  probably  be  two  or  three  weeks  be- 
for  I  get  back  to  Benque.  ...  Of  course,  since  I  left 


EL  PADRE    BUENO  193 

there  I  have  received  no  mail,  and  shan't  hear  anything 
of  the  outside  world  till  I  get  back  in  the  middle  of 
next  month.  .  .  . 

"  Take  care  of  yourself.  Hope  you  will  be  able  to 
repeat  your  visit  to  the  sea-shore  frequently.  I  don't 
think  there  is  any  exercise  better  than  good  sea-bath- 
ing. When  home  at  Benque  I  take  my  regular  plunge 
in  the  Mopan.  But  on  my  trips  it  is  different.  On 
my  way  down  I  was  glad  enough  to  find  a  place  to  sling 
up  my  hammock  and  snatch  a  few  hours  sleep  with  my 
boots  on,  just  as  I  was.  In  these  Indian  villages 
privacy  is  unknown,  and  usually  the  open  woods  as  a 
sleeping  place  are  preferable  to  the  filthy  cabins  of  the 
natives,  filled  with  fleas  and  all  sorts  of  vermin.  But 
such  is  the  life  of  the  missionary  in  these  barbarous 
places,  and  thanks  be  to  the  Lord,  He  has  given  me 
plenty  of  health  and  strength  to  stand  it. 

"  The  Rains  are  just  beginning,  and  I  expect  a  good 
tough  time  of  it  in  getting  back,  with  plenty  of  work 
ahead.  Don't  forget  to  pray  that  the  Lord  may  bless 
my  work,  for  all  the  success  must  come  from  above, 
.  .  .  The  first  bananas  I  planted  are  now  bearing,  and 
I  expect  to  start  in  on  my  vegetable  garden  again  as 
soon  as  I  return." 

"  Benque  Viejo,  July  16,  1907. 

"  Just  twenty  years  ago  to-day  since  the  Lord  al- 
lowed me  to  be  enrolled  amongst  the  sons  of  St. 
Ignatius.  I  can  hardly  realize  the  time  that  has 
passed.  .  .  .  Time  goes  quickly  when  one  is  busy. 

"  I  have  just  returned  to  Benque,  and  though  some- 
what sore  in  the  bones,  shall  be  all  right  in  a  couple  of 
days.  In  trying  to  make  one  stretch,  from  a  place 
called  Orange  Walk,  where  I  had  been  for  the  First 


194  WILLIAM  STANTON 

Friday,  to  the  Cayo,  a  distance  of  about  forty  miles,  I 
managed  to  get  a  late  start  and  was  caught  by  the 
night  when  about  half  way.  I  had  been  soaking  wet 
all  day,  with  nothing  to  eat  but  a  cup  of  coffee  and  a 
biscuit  in  the  morning,  and  had  been  in  the  saddle  all 
day ;  and  finally  it  was  so  dark,  and  still  raining,  and  I 
was  so  tired  at  midnight,  that  I  had  to  dismount  beside 
a  little  creek  and  throw  myself  on  the  wet  ground  just 
as  I  was,  until  I  had  light  enough  to  see  the  road 
again. 

"  During  the  night  my  horse  slipped  his  halter  and 
made  back  toward  his  home,  and  morning  found  me 
alone,  wet,  tired,  fasting  from  the  morning  before,  with 
a  pair  of  saddle-bags  weighing  close  on  to  fifty  pounds, 
and  about  ten  miles  from  any  human  being.  There 
was  nothing  to  do  but  to  shoulder  those  bags  and  make 
through  the  mud  for  the  Cayo.  I  arrived  there  in 
about  five  hours,  and  confess  I  could  not  have  gone 
much  further.  .  .  . 

"  As  it  was  Sunday  morning,  I  managed  to  get  a 
change  of  clothes  and  succeeded  in  saying  Mass;  but 
for  two  days  I  was  not  able  to  mount  a  horse  to  get 
back  home.  I  am  better  now,  and  the  aches  are  get- 
ting out  of  my  bones.  .  .  .  We  are  in  the  midst  of  the 
Rains  now,  and  travelling  through  the  forest  trails  at 
this  time  is  not  exactly  a  picnic.  But  it's  God's  work, 
and  what  more  profitable  can  we  be  engaged  in !  " 

It  is  curious  to  see,  in  a  letter  of  just  a  week 
later,  a  brief  resume  of  this  last  trip,  without  so 
much  as  a  reference  to  the  rather  trying  experience 
he  has  just  recounted.     Little  things  of  that  sort 


EL  PADRE     BUENO  195 

were  so  common  in  his  life  that  they  scarcely  called 
his  attention,  unless  he  happened  to  be  writing  just 
after  they  had  occurred.  He  sums  up  the  period 
covered  by  the  last  three  letters,  in  this  cheerful, 
nonchalant  way: 

"  Benque  Vie  jo,  July  24,  1907. 

"  Well,  thank  God  I  got  back  safe  and  sound  to 
Benque,  after  thirty-two  days  in  the  bush.  About 
three  hundred  and  fifty  miles  I  made  on  horseback.  I 
learned  considerably  more  this  trip  about  the  bush 
and  about  the  various  trails  they  call  roads  here.  We 
had  to  cut  our  way  through  sometimes,  but  of  course 
we  had  our  machetes  by  our  sides  and  were  all  ready 
for  it.  I  generally  managed  to  make  some  human 
habitation  by  nightfall,  but  my  boy  and  I  lost  our- 
selves several  times  and  had  to  sleep  in  the  forest.  I 
am  quite  used  to  this  by  this  time.  My  boy  was  afraid 
of  tigers  and  snakes,  but  we  came  through  all  the  way 
without  even  seeing  a  tiger. 

"  The  riding  and  swimming  of  the  animals  across 
rivers  was  pretty  rough  work,  and  I  was  laid  up  a  few 
days  with  a  bad  leg,  but  nothing  serious  happened,  and 
I  am  back  again  safe  and  fixing  up  my  vegetable  garden 
for  the  coming  year. 

"  The  Rains  have  begun,  and  a  few  days  before  my 
arrival  they  had  a  terrific  storm,  accompanied  by  hail- 
stones as  big  as  pigeons'  eggs !  No  one  here  had  ever 
seen  the  like  before.  Our  mud  house  is  pretty  well 
battered  down,  as  you  may  imagine,  but  mud  plaster  is 
cheap  here.  You  would  laugh  to  see  the  plasterers 
filling  up  the  chinks  again  with  their  hands  —  the  only 
trowels  they  know  of.  .  .  ." 


196  WILLIAM  STANTON 

Then  he  goes  on  to  talk  enthusiastically  about  his 
"  agricultural  school,"  and  begs  a  few  bulbs  and 
seeds;  he  is  going  to  try  to  grow  flowers  for  the 
altar.     He  says  of  his  people  in  general : 

".  .  .  It  is  awful  work  to  get  them  to  Mass  and 
confession  and  communion.  They  care  for  only  two 
sacraments,  baptism,  and  confirmation,  and  these  they 
don't  neglect  if  they  have  the  chance.  But  confession, 
communion,  and  matrimony,  they  seem  awfully  afraid 
of,  though  they  imagine  they  are  great  Catholics.  .  .  ." 

Now  and  then  his  aunt  got  a  letter,  of  which  the 
following  is  a  fair  sample : 

"...  A  few  days  ago,  whilst  I  was  away  in  the 
bush,  a  letter  came  here  for  me,  which  I  am  told  was 
from  San  Antonio,  and  which  I  suppose  came  from 
you  or  Mamie.  When  I  got  home,  we  searched  high 
and  low,  but  the  letter  is  not  to  be  found.  Whether  it 
was  carried  off  by  the  wind,  or  eaten  by  a  goat,  or  was 
swept  up  by  our  Carib  boy,  is  more  than  I  know.  But 
I  want  to  let  you  know,  so  that  if  there  was  anything 
important  in  the  letter,  you  might  tell  me  again." 

Well,  in  such  a  household,  naturally  anything 
might  happen.  His  aunt  and  sister  were  as  patient 
with  him  as  he  was  with  his  Indians.  Then,  of 
course,  he  was  ever  and  anon  writing  letters  which 
he  forgot  to  mail,  or  to  address.  But  he  got  over 
that  in  time,  by  writing  only  after  he  had  made 


EL  PADRE     BUENO  197 

sure  of  his  arrangements  for  getting  the  letter  off. 
He  had  been  in  Lenque  nearly  two  years  now, 
and  in  that  time  had  only  twice  been  back  even  to 
such  civilization  as  Belize  offered ;  once  in  the 
August  of  1906,  when  he  had  gone  for  his  annual 
retreat  and  to  go  through  the  ceremony  of  taking 
his  final  grade  in  the  Society  as  a  Spiritual  Co- 
adjutor; the  second  time,  about  a  year  after,  when 
his  loneliness  seized  the  chance  of  a  forced  march 
to  ride  in  for  a  day's  chat.  The  life  was  beginning 
to  tell  on  both  himself  and  his  companion.  Malaria 
attacked  the  latter,  and  forced  him  to  go  to  Belize 
to  see  a  doctor.  Fr.  Stanton  bore  the  heavier 
burden,  and  in  time  even  his  vigorous,  wiry  con- 
stitution weakened  under  it.  He  writes  from 
Benque  Viejo,  on  August  16,  1907: 

".  .  .  Many  thanks  for  your  dear  kindness.  ...  I 
answer  at  once  because  I  shall  not  have  a  chance  to 
write  again  for  a  month  or  more  as  I  must  get  off 
again  for  another  round  through  the  bush.  .  .  . 

"  For  the  past  month  I  have  been  alone  here,  as  Fr. 
Henneman  had  to  go  down  to  Belize  to  see  the  doctor. 
At  the  same  time  the  Lord  wished  to  give  me  a  little 
taste  of  sickness  and  knock  some  of  the  vanity  out  of 

me.     The  very  day  Fr.  H left  me,  I  was  taken 

down  rather  badly  with  a  curious  mixture,  chills, 
vomiting,  dysentery,  and  fever,  all  at  once.  In  about 
eight  days  it  left  me,  but  left  me  without  any  strength. 


198  WILLIAM  STANTON 

But  I  have  been  pulling  together  gradually,  and  now 
I  am  all  O.K.  and  as  good  as  new.  A  little  sickness 
is  a  mighty  good  thing,  to  teach  us  how  great  a  bless- 
ing perfect  health  is  and  how  grateful  we  ought  to  be 
for  it. 

"  I  expect  it  is  dry  enough  in  your  part  of  the  world 
now,  but  we  are  in  the  midst  of  the  Rains.  We  have 
heavy  rains  every  day,  but  often  they  pass  quickly, 
and  the  hot  sun  comes  out  right  after,  and  the  whole 
earth  is  steaming  with  moisture.  Words  can  give  no 
idea  of  our  trials  at  this  time.  But  a  good  part  of 
this  trip  I  shall  try  to  make  by  dorey  on  the  river. 
The  Bishop  is  coming  up  soon  to  visit  some  of  the 
towns  along  the  river,  and  I  must  prepare  some  of  my 
Indians  for  confirmation.  .  .  .  The  ignorance,  super- 
stition, and  vice  amongst  them  is  almost  incredible. 
But  gradually  grace  will  triumph  over  these  obstacles. 

"  Owing  to  my  little  spell  of  sickness,  my  vegetable 
garden  has  run  wild  a  little,  but  the  last  few  days  I 
and  the  boys  have  been  cleaning  it  up,  and  we  are  get- 
ting some  nice  radishes,  egg-plant,  cucumbers,  and 
green  beans,  with  other  things  coming.  Thank  you,  by 
the  way,  for  the  flower  seeds.  ...  I  shall  try  this 
year  to  grow  some  flowers  for  the  church. 

"  As  these  people  make  no  fences,  and  have  their 
hogs  inside  and  outside  their  houses,  rooting  all  around, 
you  do  not  find  anything  planted  near  the  town  or  in 
it.  Their  corn  patches  they  plant  from  three  to  eight 
miles  away  in  the  bush,  so  that  the  hogs  will  not  harm 

them.     Fr.  H and  I  have  put  a  good  fence  all 

around  our  place.  And  we  did  every  bit  of  it  our- 
selves, as  the  men  here  are  too  lazy  to  work.  .  .  ." 


EL  PADRE    BUENO  199 

In  October  he  went  to  Belize  for  his  yearly  re- 
treat, and  remained  there  two  weeks  in  all.  Writ- 
ing from  there,  he  announces  his  purpose  to  remain 
at  Benque  Viejo,  after  his  return,  until  Christmas. 
He  had  been  very  steadily  on  the  move  during  most 
of  the  rains,  and  he  determined  to  rest  a  month  or 
two,  and  not  set  out  on  his  rounds  again  until  the 
dry  season  had  begun.  We  shall  see  how  he  kept 
his  resolve. 

Of  course,  he  could  not  just  journey  straight  to 
Benque  Viejo.  He  must  make  use  of  the  op- 
portunity to  do  a  little  work  on  the  way.  He 
writes  from  a  village  up  the  river,  on  October  22 : 

"  Here  I  am,  bound  up  inactive  for  several  days, 
unable  to  move  out  of  the  house ;  and  as  I  have  pen  and 
paper  (for  a  wonder !),  I  find  it  a  good  time  to  scratch 
off  a  few  words  to  the  dear  ones  at  home. 

"  I  started  from  Belize  for  Benque  just  a  week  ago, 
on  a  little  launch  which  is  now  running  up  the  river 
to  the  Cayo.  It  took  three  days  to  reach  Orange  Walk, 
where  I  wanted  to  stop  off  for  a  day  or  two  to  visit 
this  settlement  of  negroes,  Spanish  Indians,  and 
Mayas.  We  have  the  League  established  here,  and  a 
school  with  over  sixty  children,  taught  by  one  of  my 
old  pupils  of  Belize.  .  .  . 

"  Either  Fr.  H or  I  visit  the  place  once  a  month, 

and  get  about  fifty  or  sixty  confessions  and  com- 
munions.    But  this  time  we  are  in  the  midst  of  the 


200  WILLIAM  STANTON 

Rains.  I  arrived  in  the  middle  of  a  downpour,  and 
had  great  fun  climbing  the  slippery  bank,  over  sixty 
feet  up  from  the  river.  It  has  been  raining  almost 
continually  ever  since,  and  everything  is  flooded  knee- 
deep  in  water  and  mud.  In  spite  of  the  very  bad 
weather,  I  had  from  thirty  to  forty  persons  at  Mass 
every  day,  and  so  far  have  had  twenty  confessions  and 
communions,  and  one  baptism, 

"  The  houses,  about  forty  in  number,  are  scattered 
along  the  high  bank  of  the  river,  on  the  edge  of  the 
forest.  I  am  sleeping  in  a  deserted  bush  house,  with 
the  rain  coming  down  everywhere  in  it,  except  just  in 
the  corner  where  I  have  my  hammock  slung.  Last 
night  a  swarm  of  red  ants,  that  sting  very  hotly, 
swarmed  into  the  house  and  covered  everything,  getting 
in  a  few  dozen  bites  on  my  hands  and  feet  and  neck, 
before  I  could  get  out  of  the  way  and  climb  on  to  some 
old  boards  lying  in  a  corner,  where  I  passed  the  rest 
of  the  night  in  peace.  ..." 

He  asks  his  sister  for  some  shirts,  and  apologizes 
for  asking.  Then  he  adds  a  postscript,  dated  from 
the  Cayo,  on  the  day  following: 

"  I  am  back  now  as  far  as  the  Cayo,  arriving  at  1 130 
this  morning.  Everything  flooded  with  mud  and 
water.  Pouring  rain.  I  must  get  a  horse  and  get  out 
to  Benque  to-day,  as  I  hear  Fr.  Henneman  is  not  well 
and  is  anxiously  awaiting  my  return.  Ten  miles  more 
to  make,  and  over  a  terrible  road  through  the  bush, 
with  the  horse  up  to  his  belly  in  mud  and  water  most  of 
the  time.     But  with  the  Lord's  help  I  hope  to  be  safe  at 


EL  PADRE    BUENO  201 

home  before  night.     I  must  be  off  immediately,  so 
good-bye  for  the  present  and  God  bless  you  all." 

He  wrote  no  more  than  that  he  was  "  inactive  for 
a  couple  of  days."  The  fact  is  that  he  was  laid 
up  with  a  high  fever,  and  that  it  was  a  very  sick 
man  who  set  out  on  those  "  ten  miles  more."  The 
District  Commissioner  begged  him  to  stay  with  him, 
but  he  would  not  listen.  His  partner  was  in  need ; 
he  had  to  get  to  him;  the  ride  would  shake  the 
fever  out  of  him,  he  laughingly  asserted.  He 
stumbled  into  Benque  at  nightfall,  reeling  in  the 
saddle.  He  turned  in  to  nurse  his  companion,  who 
was  too  sick  to  notice  that  his  nurse  was  stagger- 
ing with  fever.  But  he  was  well  almost  as  soon 
as  the  other,  such  was  his  astonishing  vitality,  and 
in  less  than  a  week  was  off  on  the  journey  of  which 
he  gives  his  account  in  the  following  letter  home : 

"  Benque  Viejo,  November  6,  1907. 
"  I  have  Just  returned  safely  from  one  of  the 
dirtiest  trips  I  have  yet  made.  It  was  a  visit  to  three 
different  Indian  towns  hidden  away  in  the  deep  bush. 
I  have  been  away  only  a  week,  having  made  some  hun- 
dred and  sixty  miles  on  horseback,  the  whole  of  it 
through  dense  jungle,  where  the  mid-day  sun  scarcely 
penetrates,  my  poor  beast  plowing  through  sticky  mud 
and  tangled  roots,  usually  sinking  above  his  knees, 
whilst  the  rider,  machete  in  hand,  had  to  chop  and  cut 


202  WILLIAM  STANTON 

through  the  mass  of  rank  vegetation  and  hanging  hanas 
that  very  often  completely  closed  the  so-called  road, 
M^hich  is  nothing  but  a  narrow  Indian  trail. 

"  After  travelling  thus  for  a  whole  day,  one  comes 
to  the  collection  of  miserable  huts  forming  the  village, 
and  wonders  why  any  human  beings  should  choose  to 
live  in  such  a  place.  But  the  Indian  does  not  like  to 
be  bothered  by  the  white  man  or  by  the  negroes  of  the 
Colony,  and  looks  for  such  out-of-the-way  places  far 
from  any  other  town.  There  he  plants  his  little 
*  milpa '  or  corn  patch,  hunts  the  wild  animals,  and 
lives  as  his  ancestors  did  thousands  of  years  ago. 

"  These  Indians  of  Yaalbaac,  Chorro,  and  San  Jose 
are  all  nominally  Catholics,  but  are  almost  entirely 
ignorant  of  the  teachings  of  the  church  and  full  of  all 
sorts  of  strange  superstitions  and  pagan  practices. 
They  have  their  little  bush  church,  where  one  finds  the 
altar  made  of  little  saplings  and  sticks,  sometimes 
covered  over  with  clay  and  whitewashed.  There  are 
always  a  number  of  wooden  crosses  on  it,  dressed  in 
rags  and  ribbons  of  various  colours,  and  sometimes  a 
picture  of  the  saints,  or  coloured  advertisements,  pla- 
cards such  as  Schlitz'  Beer,  Renter's  Soap,  or  Hen- 
nessy's  Brandy,  before  which  the  poor  creatures  burn 
candles  made  from  the  wax  of  the  wild  bee,  and  in- 
cense which  they  get  from  the  trees  of  the  forest. 

"  I  gathered  them  together  for  some  instructions, 
so  far  as  my  time  would  permit ;  had  rosary  and  other 
prayers  in  the  evening,  and  celebrated  Mass,  etc.  The 
babies  were  brought  to  be  baptized,  and  a  number  of 
marriages  were  arranged  for  my  next  visit. 

"  But  the  man  is  now  calling  for  the  mail.  So  I 
must  conclude.     Love  to  each  and  every  one. 


EL  PADRE     BUENO  203 

**  It  is  still  the  Rains,  and  travelling  is  awful.  But  I 
don't  contemplate  any  more  trips  till  after  Christmas, 
as  there  is  a  great  deal  to  do  in  Benque  —  getting  the 
children  ready  for  the  end  of  school,  their  entertain- 
ment, getting  up  a  drama  too  for  the  young  men  and 
girls,  etc.  .  .  ." 

He  did  stay  home  in  Benque  then  for  a  couple  of 
months,  barring,  of  course,  sick  calls  and  the  like. 
He  made  use  of  the  time  to  give  a  new  impetus  to 
his  "  agricultural  college,"  as  he  called  it,  which  was 
almost  always  in  need  of  a  new  impulse,  but  which 
eventually  did  a  great  deal  of  good.  Life  even 
"  at  home  "  was  anything  but  idle.  He  writes  on 
November  25 : 

".  .  .  The  Indians  and  Peteneros  are  certainly  the 
most  miserable  Indians  I  have  yet  had  to  deal  with. 
They  are  far  below  the  Filipinos  in  civilization,  and  so 
lazy  that  so  long  as  there  is  a  handful  of  corn  in  the 
house  you  could  not  get  them  to  move  a  finger  for  love 
or  money.  In  a  country  so  rich  that  the  soil  will  grow 
anything  if  you  only  tickle  the  surface  of  it,  they  are 
half  starving  during  the  few  months  of  the  year  when 
the  corn  is  scarce.  .  .  . 

"  We  are  trying  however  to  train  the  children,  and 
in  the  evenings  I  take  the  boys  in  the  last  hour  of 
school  and  teach  them  gardening.  To  each  boy  I  give 
a  plot  or  two  of  ground,  show  him  how  to  clean  and 
cultivate  it  and  grow  various  useful  vegetables.  Our 
school  garden  is  now  quite  a  wonder,  and  the  children 


204  WILLIAM  STANTON 

have  already  gathered  and  learned  to  eat  their  radishes, 
cabbages,  tomatoes,  etc.  This  is  why  I  need  fresh 
seeds  from  time  to  time. 

"  We  have  just  started  a  new  church  in  one  of  my 
stations.  It  is  going  to  be  a  very  fancy  one,  actually 
built  of  boards,  with  a  corrugated  iron  roof  shipped  up 
the  river  from  Belize.  All  the  other  churches  in  our 
district  are  only  of  mud  and  sticks,  with  thatch  roof, 
just  like  our  house.  .  .  . 

"  I  have  just  been  run  out  of  the  house  for  a  while 
by  what  we  call  the  '  marching  army.'  These  are  large, 
black,  shining  ants,  that  hunt  in  huge  columns  several 
feet  wide  and  sometimes  several  hundred  yards  long. 
They  stop  at  nothing,  and  clean  up  all  insects  and 
smaller  animals  that  come  in  their  path.  .  .  .  The  dog 
is  attacked,  and  is  yelping  and  running  about  like  mad. 
,  .  .  They  swarmed  up  my  feet  and  legs  before  I  knew 
it,  and  they  bite  with  a  grip  like  a  bulldog's,  never 
letting  go  till  you  simply  pull  them  to  pieces,  and  even 
then  often  the  jaws  stay  locked  in  your  skin.  The 
only  thing  to  do  is  to  clear  out  and  wait  till  they  pass, 
which  usually  takes  from  about  fifteen  minutes  to  a 
half  hour.  They  are  pretty  good  visitors  (that  is,  if 
you  yourself  are  not  caught  by  them!)  as  they  clean 
out  every  cockroach,  scorpion,  centipede,  and  other 
insect  in  the  house.  When  they  come,  we  simply  leave 
everything  open  and  get  out  of  the  way  till  they  have 
finished  and  pass.  .  .  . 

"  They  have  left  the  house,  but  I  hear  my  boys  in  the 
kitchen  jumping  and  squealing,  so  I  see  they  are  in- 
vestigating things  out  there.  .  .  .  Now  I  hear  them  at 
the  little  chickens.  .  .  . 

"  Just  saved  the  little  chicks,  but  we  had  a  lively  time 


EL  PADRE    BUENO  205 

of  it,  with  Fr.  Henneman  and  myself  and  the  two  house 
boys  hopping  about  hke  crazy  men —  10:30  p.m. —  the 
ground  aHve  with  the  vicious  insects,  cHmbing  all  over 
us  —  but  we  saved  the  chicks. 

"  So  you  see  there  is  no  want  of  variety  in  our  life, 
even  if  we  are  in  the  jungle.  .  .  . 

*'  Excuse  blots  —  hard  to  keep  still  —  no  time  to 
write  over  again." 

But  he  is  never  too  busy  to  write  home,  and  he 
finds  time  even  for  special  letters  now  and  then  to 
his  little  niece  and  nephew.  The  little  thatched 
hut  of  the  hard-riding  missionary  has  a  place  for 
kindly  tokens  of  home.  He  tells  the  seven  year  old 
nephew : 

"  When  any  of  the  little  fellows  of  our  town  come 
into  my  house  they  like  to  look  at  your  picture  which 
hangs  on  the  mud  wall  of  our  '  parlor,'  and  they  say : 
*  Mira,  mira,  que  muchachito  tan  lindo !  Es  el  sobri- 
nito  del  Padre  Guillermo,  se  llama  Joseito ! '  You  get 
Marie  to  translate  this  for  you ;  she  knows  Span- 
ish. .  .  ." 

The  beginning  of  1908  saw  him  off  on  his  rounds 
again.  There  had  been  a  great  deal  of  sickness  in 
the  district,  which  kept  him  more  than  ordinarily 
hard  at  work,  both  as  priest  and  doctor.  On  his 
second  long  round,  in  March,  he  writes  home: 

".  .  .  Thank  God,  Fr.  H and  I  have  so  far  been 


2o6  WILLIAM  STANTON 

preserved.  I  am  nursing  a  lame  left  arm  and  shoulder, 
from  a  sudden  fall  my  horse  had  on  the  road  a  few 
days  ago.  I  came  down  under  him,  striking  my  left 
shoulder  first,  but  it  is  only  a  bruise,  nothing  broken, 
and  it  will  be  all  right  in  a  few  days.  My  health  is 
simply  splendid. 

"  Almost  forgot  to  tell  you  of  my  first  attempt  at 
making  preserves.  It  was  a  great  success  — '  Papaya 
preserves.'  The  fruit  I  grew  in  my  own  garden,  and 
I  made  the  preserves  all  myself.  Don't  laugh!  I  in- 
tended to  send  you  a  sample,  but  had  no  time  to  pack 
it  before  I  left  Benque.  I'll  send  you  some  of  my 
next  experiment.  .  .  ." 

But  lame  shoulder  and  all  —  and  it  was  a  very 
lame  shoulder  indeed  —  he  pushed  on,  making  a 
more  thorough  visitation  of  his  district.  It  w^as 
the  dry  season  now,  and  the  country  was  more  pass- 
able. But  of  that  tropical  country,  perhaps  we 
might  remark  here  that  the  loveliness  attributed  to 
it  by  northern  fancy  exists  only  in  rare  instances ; 
though  some  of  these  are  wonderful  enough.  In 
general,  tropical  scenery  is  decidedly  ugly  and  more 
than  a  little  oppressive.  Open  country  of  any  sort 
is  quite  the  exception ;  the  rule  being  a  dense,  rank 
riot  of  vegetation  impenetrable  to  the  eye  as  it  is 
to  passage  for  travel.  The  view  is  always  narrow, 
and  always  the  same;  a  matted  wall  of  bushes, 
vines,   tree   trunks,   with   little   variety   of   colour. 


EL  PADRE     BUENO  207 

The  rank  odour  of  ever-decaying  vegetation  fills  the 
air.  One  moves  as  if  in  a  steaming,  reeking  prison 
of  dull  green.  Except  at  the  end  of  the  dry  season, 
soggy  swamps  abound,  even  in  the  high  uplands ;  the 
home  of  caymans  and  snakes.  It  is  a  dreary,  silent 
land,  heavy,  sodden,  lonely ;  a  more  frightful  desert 
because  of  its  wild  exuberance  of  listless  sleepy  life. 
It  is  a  brave,  bright  spirit  indeed  that  can  live  for 
years  in  it  without  being  weighed  down  by  its  mas- 
sive heaviness,  its  solitary  gloom.  Those  who 
know  the  country  must  marvel  always  at  the  cheer- 
fulness of  the  missionaries,  and  should  at  least  sus- 
pect that  the  source  of  that  cheerfulness  was  not 
merely  human. 

And  lest  we  should  imagine  that  Fr.  Stanton's 
cheerfulness  was  only  assumed  in  order  to  quiet 
possible  apprehensions  of  his  family,  here  is  a  letter 
written  on  this  tour  of  his  stations  to  a  Father  in 
Belize,  an  intimate  friend,  a  fellow-missionary, 
with  whom  he  may  assuredly  speak  plainly : 

"  San  Jose,  Wayoutnovvhere, 
"  St.  Patrick's  Day  in  the  Mornin',  1908. 
"  Mil  saludes  from  the  depths  of  the  bush  on  this 
glorious  '  day  we  celebrate.'  My  Indians  are  firing 
off  bombs,  loud  enough  for  St.  Patrick  to  hear  in 
heaven,  though  they  had  never  heard  of  the  shamrock 
before  to-day.     I  don't  mean  to  say  the  racket  is  for 


2o8  WILLIAM  STANTON 

Erin's  patron  saint;  it's  all  for  el  Senor  San  Jose  — 
Mr.  St.  Joseph. 

"  We  are  in  the  midst  of  the  novena.  But  it  is  not 
all  shooting.  The  days  are  pretty  full,  instructing  the 
grown-ups  singly  and  together,  teaching  prayers,  cate- 
chism, and  singing  to  the  children,  trying  to  regulate  a 
few  crooked  unions,  studying  the  ways  and  customs  of 
the  untutored  Indian,  and  working  away  at  Maya.  So 
the  days  of  the  novena  pass.  I  began  the  confessions 
last  night.  Everything  in  Maya  —  and  I  am  still  alive 
and  kicking. 

"  But  if  ever  I  see  civilized  life  again,  or  get  to 
Belize  in  this  life,  please  don't  show  me  anything  that 
even  looks  like  a  chicken  on  the  table.  My  digestive 
apparatus  is  still  in  the  ring;  though  if  it  survives  the 
present  strain  of  tortilla  and  chicken  swimming  in  hog- 
grease  three  times  a  day  for  ten  days  at  a  stretch,  I 
think  it  will  deserve  a  gold  medal. 

"  Friday,  the  20th,  I  intend  to  be  off  for  Holotonich, 
the  limit  of  my  stamping-ground  in  this  direction. 
From  there  I  shall  run  up  to  Orange  Walk,  New  River 
—  think  I  can  make  it  in  three  days.  I  have  a  good 
reason,  to  steal  a  bottle  of  Mass  wine  from  the  Padres 
there,  for  the  single  bottle  I  brought  with  me  from 
the  Cayo  will  have  been  spent.  I  hope  you  got  my 
letter  and  have  sent  some  wine  to  Benque,  where  only 
two  bottles  remained  when  I  left.  And  don't  forget 
to  send  me  a  bottle  to  Orange  Walk,  Old  River,  in  care 
of  Broster,  to  await  my  arrival  there,  as  otherwise  I 
shall  have  no  Mass  for  the  rest  of  the  trip  up  the  river. 

"  After  saying  Hello  to  the  Padres  at  O.  W.,  New 
River,  I  have  to  get  back  to  Holotonich,  and  from 
there  strike  across  country  to  the  Old  River  —  ought 


EL  PADRE    BUENO  209 

to  make  it  in  five  days  —  hoping  to  come  out  at  Satur- 
day Creek,  or  near  Coquericot.  .  .  . 

"  At  O.  W.,  Old  River,  I  may  have  to  stay  a  week 
or  so,  to  see  if  I  can't  get  them  started  on  their  new 
church.  From  there  I  work  up  through  S.  Francisco, 
etc.,  to  the  Cayo,  hoping  to  get  back  to  Benque  in  time 
for  Holy  Week. 

"  I  left  Benque  three  weeks  ago,  and  have  not,  of 

course,  heard  of  Fr.  H since.     I  hope  he  is  all 

right,  though  the  grippe  or  dengue  or  whatever  you 
call  the  blamed  thing  was  prevalent  there  then.  .  ,  . 

"  Don't  know  when  this  will  reach  you,  as  I  don't 
know  when  I  shall  be  able  to  get  it  to  the  nearest  post- 
ofifice.  But  I  trust  in  the  end  you  will  get  it,  and  in 
case  you  hear  no  news  of  me  in  the  next  six  months, 
kindly  send  out  an  expedition  to  discover  Spot's  bones, 
which  ought  to  be  plainly  visible  somewhere  in  the 
district.  Poor  old  horse  !  he  deserves  Christian  burial ; 
he  does  most  of  the  work. 

"  P.  S.  March  26.    Robert  Wade  Bank, 

near  Holotonich. 

"  Didn't  get  my  epistle  off  to  you  yet.  Meantime 
the  world  moves.     I  tave  taken  my  little  run  to  see 

M and    N ;    found    K too    at    Orange 

Walk.  .  .  . 

"  I  reached  here  at  2:00  a.m.,  pretty  tired.  Am  re- 
maining till  to-morrow  for  a  marriage  and  a  number  of 
confessions  and  communions.  To-morrow  early  I 
strike  over  from  Holotonich  to  the  Belize  River,  hop- 
ing to  come  out  near  Banana  Bank.  .  .  .  Tell  *  el 
Padre  viejo '  I  have  several  scores  to  settle  with  him, 
if  I  ever  meet  him  in  the  flesh.  .  .  ." 


2IO  WILLIAM  STANTON 

Fr.  Stanton  got  through  to  the  Belize  River,  but 
poor  old  Spot  did  not;  he  bogged  down  hopelessly 
in  the  mud  in  the  midst  of  the  jungle,  leagues  away 
from  help.  Fr.  Stanton  rescued  his  saddle  and 
saddle-bags,  and  sent  on  the  one  old  Indian  who 
accompanied  him,  to  borrow  a  horse  from  a  good 
Protestant  friend,  whose  ranch  was  only  half  a 
day's  ride  distant. 

It  may  be  mentioned  here  that  in  their  regard  for 
Fr.  Stanton,  there  was  no  distinction  between 
Catholic  and  Protestant  in  the  Colony.  The 
Protestant  planters  along  the  river  always  wel- 
comed him  with  delight;  their  houses  were  open 
to  him  at  any  time  of  day  or  night.  Their  purses 
were  open  too.  But  he  had  a  delicacy  about  ask- 
ing them  to  help  out  his  churches,  and  for  him- 
self and  his  house  he  never  begged ;  in  fact,  he  saw 
no  reason  for  begging  in  behalf  of  the  latter;  he  had 
everything  he  needed,  he  said.  His  sister  and  aunt 
supplied  him  with  everything  he  asked  for  his 
church  and  mission. 

This  was  his  third  year  at  Benque  Viejo,  and  his 
steady,  patient  work  with  the  Indians  was  beginning 
to  tell ;  they  were  frequenting  the  sacraments  more, 
and  attending  Mass.     It  meant  more  to  him  than 


EL  PADRE    BUENO  211 

anything  else  could  mean.  God's  work  was  suc- 
ceeding. Of  course,  he  gave  all  the  credit  to  God, 
but  he  was  very  happy  himself  to  be  God's  instru- 
ment in  it  all.  He  had  been  content  to  plant  and 
water,  leaving  the  reaping  to  others  when  he  had 
gone.  It  was  delightful  that  even  in  his  own  time 
the  harvest  should  begin  to  whiten.  These  begin- 
nings of  success  heartened  him  wonderfully,  gave 
him  new  brightness  and  courage.  He  did  not  need 
a  rest ;  the  work  was  rest  for  him  now.  So  he  said, 
and  thought;  and  drove  on  with  new  vigour.  But 
it  was  puzzling  to  him  that  attacks  of  sickness 
seemed  to  come  with  greater  frequency ;  it  does  not 
occur  to  him,  apparently,  that  he  was  using  up  even 
his  superb  vitality.  In  a  letter  written  home  after 
his  last  long  round  of  forty  days,  he  says,  quite  in- 
cidentally : 

".  .  .  My  health  is  splendid,  thank  God,  Here  at 
Benque,  however,  on  Palm  Sunday  I  suddenly  got  an 
attack  in  my  right  leg,  just  as  I  did  in  the  middle  of 
my  May  trip  last  year,  and  I  was  laid  up  with  it  all 

Holy  Week.     As  I  was  alone,  Fr.  H having  gone 

to  the  Cayo  for  Ploly  Week,  the  poor  Benque  people 
had  to  do  without  some  of  their  principal  processions 
and  ceremonies,  as  I  only  managed  to  crawl  down  to 
the  church  the  last  few  days  of  the  week,  to  perform 


212  WILLIAM  STANTON 

the  most  necessary  functions  as  best  I  could  under  the 
circumstances.  Thank  God,  the  leg  is  all  right  again, 
and  I  am  able  to  be  around  as  usual. 

"  Work  at  home  has  been  piling  up  whilst  I  was 
gone.     I  hardly  know  where  to  begin.  ,  .  ." 

Sickness  did  not  fret  him  or  make  him  impatient. 
It  was  a  bore,  of  course,  as  it  kept  him  from  his 
work.  But  beyond  that,  it  was  merely  puzzling. 
Why,  he  never  used  to  get  sick !  Every  letter  is 
sure  to  have  in  it  somewhere,  "  My  health  is 
splendid ;  "  even  though  it  went  on  to  say  that  he 
was  out  four  days  with  fever.  And  when  he  was 
"  out,"  he  was  really  sick ;  trifling  ailments  he 
simply  disregarded.  As  we  shall  see,  it  was  not 
long  before  he  had  more  and  more  reason  to  be 
puzzled.  In  the  meantime,  he  kept  on  with  his 
work. 

Woods  and  rivers  had  their  treacheries  too,  as 
well  as  their  weariness.  He  rarely  speaks  of  ac- 
cidents, though  there  were  many  of  them  in  his 
toilsome  days.  At  most,  he  says  in  his  letters  from 
time  to  time,  "  We  came  through  without  any 
serious  accidents."  When  he  does  mention  some 
mischance,  it  is  merely  as  something  curious  and 
interesting;  often  enough,  as  a  thing  to  chuckle 
over;  it  is  his  old  balance,  and  sanity,  and  humour. 
Take  this  letter,  for  instance: 


EL  PADRE     BUENO  213 

"  El  Cayo,  May  19,  1908. 
"  My  dearest  Sister : 

"  Pardon  this  paper,  but  I  am  at  El  Cayo  to-day  and 
have  a  chance  to  send  off  mail  and  have  no  paper  at 
hand.  .  .  . 

"  My  health  is  splendid,  thank  God.  I  have  just 
returned  from  another  trip  —  had  a  narrow  escape 
from  being  crushed  to  death  by  a  tree  that  crashed 
down  suddenly  across  the  road,  just  touching  my 
horse's  head  as  I  reined  him  up.  A  second  more,  and 
I  would  have  been  under  it.  I  was  alone,  it  was  night, 
and  quite  in  the  midst  of  the  forest.  But  my  guardian 
angel  was  at  my  side,  watching,  and  evidently  my  time 
had  not  yet  come,  anyhow. 

"  On  the  way  back,  my  horse  was  somewhat  knocked 
up,  and  night  caught  me  in  the  bush,  where  I  slept 
soundly  till  daylight.  .  .  .  Next  morning,  my  poor 
horse  bogged  in  the  mud  and  with  great  difficulty  I 
managed  to  get  him  out,  both  of  us  completely  plas- 
tered with  mud  from  head  to  foot.  I  told  him  I  hoped 
I  didn't  look  as  foolish  as  he  did. 

"  As  it  *  never  rains  but  it  pours,'  my  shoes  v^rent  to 
pieces  (they  were  pretty  old,  anyway)  from  the  mud 
and  water;  the  horse  was  so  weak  he  could  hardly 
move;  so  I  had  to  foot  it,  driving  the  horse  slowly 
before  me  with  the  saddle-bags,  till  I  reached  the  Cayo, 
a  distance  of  about  twenty  miles.  I  got  here  pretty 
foot-sore  and  tired,  but,  thank  God,  in  splendid  condi- 
tion oth'erwise. 

"  You  see,  we  don't  travel  in  Pullman  coaches  or 
automobiles  down  here ;  but  we  don't  need  them  for 
saving  souls,  and  the  missioner  is  probably  just  as 


214  WILLIAM  STANTON 

happy  without  them.  I  realize  more  and  more  how 
many  things  there  are  in  civiHzed  hfe  as  we  Hve  it  in 
the  States,  which  we  look  upon  as  necessities,  but 
which  are  really  only  luxuries,  as  one  finds  out  in  life 
like  this.  .  .  ." 

He  was  down  with  fever  again  in  June,  but  he 
evidently  forgot  it ;  for  when  he  wrote  to  his  sister 
on  June  30,  he  starts  off  with  the  old  refrain: 

".  .  .  As  for  myself,  I  am  in  first  class  health,  as 

usual.     Fr.   H has  been  working  up  the   Cayo 

town  for  the  past  month,  and  I  have  Benque  all  to 
myself.  Thanks  be  to  God,  the  devotion  to  the  Sacred 
Heart  is  beginning  to  take  hold  in  the  town,  and 
whereas  last  year  we  succeeded  in  getting  only  about 
forty  persons  to  the  sacraments  for  their  Easter  duties, 
this  year  I  had  over  two  hundred  communions  during 
the  month  of  June  alone,  whilst  we  have  from  seventy 
to  a  hundred  every  month.  It  is  awful  up-hill  work, 
but  God  is  bound  to  triumph.  Pray  hard  for  these 
poor  ignorant  long-neglected  souls  confided  to  my 
care.  .  .  ." 

Things  are  going  fine  at  Benque.  He  has  built 
a  chickenhouse,  cleared  a  pasture,  put  up  more 
fences,  enlarged  the  garden.  It  is  hard  to  get  a 
cook,  but  then  "  fortunately  both  Fr.  H.  and  I  have 
very  good  stomachs,  and  we  get  along  where  a  per- 
son used  to  regular,  well-cooked  meals  might  be 
knocked   out."     There   is   mention,    for   the   first 


EL  PADRE    BUENO  215 

time,  of  a  projected  new  house.  A  couple  of  years, 
or  rather  a  couple  of  Rains,  is  a  fair  life  for  a  bush 
house.  The  new  house  came,  nearly  two  years 
later,  but  he  never  lived  in  it.  Then  follows  a 
paragraph  in  the  same  letter,  which  I  shall  quote 
without  comment;  this  is  not  a  sketch  of  the  Stan- 
ton family.  Besides,  no  comment  is  really  neces- 
sary.    He  continues : 

".  .  .  You  speak  of  your  plan  of  coming  down  here, 
when  the  children  are  grown,  etc.,  to  look  after  my  ma- 
terial wants  and  comforts,  if  God  spares  us  all  so  many 
years.  Well,  my  dear,  that  would  of  course  be  fine, 
for  me;  but  for  you  it  would  need  a  special  vocation 
from  the  Lord,  for  Benque  and  its  surroundings  is  not 
a  place  where  a  civilized  white  woman  would  care  to 
pass  any  length  of  time.  .  .  ." 

That  generous  plan  might  have  been  carried  out, 
"if  God  had  spared  them  so  many  years";  but 
the  years  before  him  were  few.  The  letter  in  which 
he  rejected  her  offer  is  blurred  and  blotted. 

A  month  later,  he  went  again  to  Belize  for  his 
retreat.  It  was  delightful,  he  writes,  to  meet  some 
of  his  "  own  people  "  again,  to  live  for  a  few  weeks 
in  a  real  house.  Then  back  to  his  work,  and  the 
old  round  over  again.  In  his  next  round  of  the 
pueblos,  undertaken  as  soon  as  he  got  "  home,"  oc- 


2i6  WILLIAM  STANTON 

curred  a  little  incident  to  which  he  refers  jokingly 
in  one  of  his  letters,  as  an  instance  of  how  even 
the  knack  of  swimming  may  come  in  usefully.  The 
facts,  as  supplemented  by  Fr.  Henneman,  were  not 
precisely  a  joke. 

It  was  the  Rains.  He  had  gone  to  visit  a,  village 
called  San  Antonio,  lying  out  of  the  path  of  his 
usual  rounds.  On  his  way  he  crossed  the  river  at 
a  ford,  where  he  had  crossed  dozens  of  times  be- 
fore. When  he  came  to  the  ford  on  his  return 
from  San  Antonio,  the  river  was  higher,  the  cur- 
rent stronger.  His  horse  was  swept  off  his  feet. 
Fr.  Stanton  slipped  out  of  the  saddle  and  swam 
beside  the  horse  as  he  had  often  to  do  when  cross- 
ing rivers.  Some  quarter  of  a  mile  below  there 
was  a  dangerous  fall  in  the  river.  But  horse  and 
rider  both  managed  to  reach  the  bank  a  hundred 
yards  above  the  fall.  Fr.  Stanton  caught  hold  of 
a  branch  to  pull  himself  out  of  the  stream.  The 
branch  broke  and  came  down  atop  of  him.  He 
dived  out  of  the  way,  but  when  he  came  up  saw  that 
the  current  was  carrying  him  on  to  the  fall.  It 
was  hopeless  to  try  to  get  back  again  to  the  bank; 
the  current  was  too  strong;  so  with  a  prayer  to  his 
guardian  angel  he  struck  out  for  the  deepest  water, 
and  went  over  the  fall.     Some  Indians  in  a  dorey, 


EL  PADRE    BUENO  217 

hugging  the  bank  below  to  come  as  close  as  they 
might  to  the  fall  before  making  the  portage,  saw 
the  bearded  white  man  come  over  the  roaring 
tumble  of  water,  and  dropped  their  paddles  in 
terror,  crying  out  that  it  was  "  un  brujo,"  a  wizard, 
a  spirit!  But  the  "brujo"  came  safely  through, 
and  with  long,  powerful  strokes  cut  in  a  great 
slant  across  the  current  and  reached  the  bank.  He 
was  encumbered  with  clothing,  boots,  machete,  shot- 
bag —  though  he  lost  his  boots  in  the  fall.  He 
waved  a  hand  cheerily  to  the  Indians,  and  started 
to  cut  a  path  with  his  machete  through  the  bush, 
travelling  back  along  the  bank.  Somehow  or  other 
his  horse  had  succeeded  in  landing,  and  he  found 
the  animal  waiting  for  him  above  the  fall.  The  real 
annoyance,  he  wrote,  was  that  "  everything  inside 
and  outside  of  my  saddle-bags  was  completely 
soaked.  But  in  a  few  hours  I  reached  the  Cayo, 
where  the  D.  C.  kindly  lent  me  a  complete  change 
of  clothes,  and  I  spread  all  my  trappings  out  in  the 
sun  to  dry." 

The  letter  goes  on  with  the  usual  "  Thank  God, 
my  health  keeps  splendid !  "  But  Fr.  Henneman  is 
not  at  all  well.  Indeed,  before  long  he  had  to  give 
up  Benque  for  good.  After  another  couple  of 
months  alone,  Fr.  Stanton  received  a  new  comrade 


±i8  WILLIAM  STANTON 

in  his  place,  the  Reverend  Arthur  Versavel,  S.J., 
who  is  still  working  away  in  Benque  Viejo. 

Naturally,  the  letters  of  these  years  contain  many 
little  interesting  jottings  about  the  Indians  and 
their  customs,  the  tropical  country,  its  plants,  insects, 
animals.  He  had  not  lost  his  quick  eye  for  observ- 
ing. But  of  such  things  perhaps  we  had  better 
speak  in  another  chapter. 


CHAPTER  XIII 

A  great  deal  might  be  written  of  Fr.  Stanton's 
scientific  work  even  during  these  hard  years  of  toil 
as  a  missionary  in  Honduras.  But  if  we  rank  that 
work  as  he  ranked  it,  in  comparison  with  his  duty 
as  a  priest,  we  may  be  very  brief  indeed.  When 
he  came  back  to  the  mission,  he  came  to  work  for 
souls.  Nothing  is  more  certain  than  that  that  was 
his  engrossing  interest  for  the  rest  of  his  life.  He 
grudged  any  jot  of  time  or  energy  that  might  be 
taken  from  it.  Yet  the  scientific  habits  of  nearly 
a  lifetime  could  not  be  wholly  ignored.  He  simply 
could  not  help  "  observing,"  and  there  were  occa- 
sional moments  along  the  jungle  paths  or  in  the 
swamps  when  he  forgot  everything  but  the  interest- 
ing phenomena  at  hand. 

Of  what  we  may  call  his  practical  science,  of  his 
"  agricultural  college,"  his  experiments  with  useful 
plants,  vegetables,  fruits,  flowers,  to  which,  partly 
as  a  matter  of  immediate  necessity,  partly  as  an  in- 
direct effort  in  the  training  of  his  people,  he  gave 
a  great  deal  of  his  time  in  Benque  Vie  jo,  there  is 

219 


220  WILLIAM  STANTON 

no  need  to  say  much.  They  deservedly  attracted 
some  attention  in  the  Colony,  and  in  the  end  were 
of  considerable  real  benefit  to  his  people.  Various 
attempts  have  since  been  made  to  imitate  his  teach- 
ing in  several  parts  of  the  Colony.  It  is  an  obvious 
part  of  the  civilizing  of  the  Indians. 

His  interest  in  more  speculative  sciences  was 
wide-spread.  Anthropology,  archaeology,  ento- 
mology, botany,  natural  history  in  every  branch,  all 
had  an  attraction  for  him.  For  those  who  knew 
him,  he  often  brought  to  mind  Coleridge's 

"  He  prayeth  best  who  loveth  best 
All  things  both  great  and  small : 
For  the  dear  God  Who  loveth  us 
He  made  and  loveth  all." 

There  was  always  a  touch  of  the  humorous,  the 
affectionate,  in  his  keen  observation  of  bird  and 
beast  and  insect.  No  amount  of  accurate  knowl- 
edge ever  dulled  the  swift,  boyish  wonder  of  his 
mind.  And  no  marvel  of  structure  or  organization 
or  instinct  but  brought  him  on  directly  to  thought 
of  "  the  dear  God  .  .  .  Who  made  and  loveth  all." 
For  such  faith  as  his,  Nature  was  indeed  an  open 
book,  but  an  open  prayer-book. 

Don't  fancy  a  grotesque,  dreaming  missionary- 


THE  SCIENTIST  221 

naturalist,  with  a  bible  in  one  hand  and  a  magnify- 
ing glass  in  the  other  —  the  staple  butt  of  humor- 
ists. Fr.  Stanton  was  infinitely  removed  from  that. 
He  was  decidedly  a  sturdy,  vigorous,  four-square 
man,  with  a  most  masculine  directness  of  character 
and  purpose  and  accomplishment.  Without  any 
swagger  or  bluster,  he  might  have  ridden  in  a  troop 
of  "  The  Rough  Riders  "  and  been  at  home.  Re- 
ligion, faith,  were  a  flame  in  his  heart;  not  a  badge 
on  his  sleeve,  nor  a  frothy  sentiment  in  his  mouth. 
One  could  as  readily  fancy  him  flying  through  the 
air  as  fancy  him  prosing  piously  over  a  flower  or 
a  bird.  If  his  thought  was  coloured  by  the  creative 
vision  that  faith  gives,  his  speech,  with  the  well- 
chewed  pipe-stem  in  his  teeth,  was  coloured  mainly 
by  humour  —  which,  after  all,  is  not  such  a  bad 
expression  of  faith.  He  saw  God  in  all  the  world, 
not  as  a  mystic  sees  Him,  but  as  any  real  Christian 
may  see  Him;  and  he  spoke  of  Him  with  the  ret- 
icences which  convention  (foolish  or  not)  has  put 
upon  a  gentleman. 

Perhaps  he  knew  as  much  about  the  Maya  and 
Lacandon  Indians  as  any  man  of  his  time,  not  of 
their  blood,  could  know.  He  might  have  written 
a  very  interesting  volume  on  them.  But  he  studied 
them  primarily  as  their  very  level-headed  pastor, 


222  WILLIAM  STANTON 

that  he  might  know  how  to  make  Christianity  a 
more  actual  and  vital  thing  for  them.  Folk-lore, 
traditions,  customs,  their  immediate  ways  of  life  — 
he  was  steeped  in  them.  He  had  no  time  to  dig  up 
Maya  ruins  and  inscriptions,  but  he  knew  all  of 
them  that  had  already  been  unearthed  in  his  dis- 
trict. He  took  pictures  of  them,  gathered  notes 
for  a  lecture  on  them. 

He  knew  most  of  the  immense  variety  of  trees 
and  plants  that  surrounded  him,  their  habits,  their 
uses  as  food  or  medicine,  their  conditions  of 
growth,  so  far  as  observation  and  the  knowl- 
edge possessed  by  the  Indians  could  inform  him. 
Though  he  never  went  out  of  his  way  to  study  these 
things,  nor  ever  for  an  hour  neglected  his  real  work 
for  them,  neither  did  he  let  pass  the  thousands  of 
incidental  opportunities  for  picking  up  information. 
He  studied  only  as  he  rode  or  tramped  or  paddled, 
but  he  studied  extremely  well. 

It  was  living  things,  as  always,  that  interested 
him  most.  He  not  merely  kept  up,  he  improved, 
his  acquaintance  with  snakes,  insects,  beasts  of  the 
forest.  Every  journey  through  the  bush  gave  him 
new  information,  and  often  specimens.  He  had  a 
few  books,  good  ones;  and  he  pored  over  them 
and  his  specimens  at  night,  when  his  day's  work 


THE  SCIENTIST  223 

was  done  and  his  people  were  all  snug  in  their 
beds.  Nor,  hidden  away  though  he  was  in  the 
bush,  could  he  drop  out  of  the  world  of  science  that 
had  begun  to  know  him.  His  correspondence  was 
considerable.  And  though  he  might  find  no  little 
difficulty  in  getting  any  sort  of  box  in  which  to  ship 
his  specimens  to  the  Smithsonian  Institution  or  to 
scientific  friends,  his  sister  saw  to  it  that  at  least 
he  had  neatly  engraved  cards  to  accompany  them. 

A  ride  with  him  through  the  bush  would  delight 
any  live  man.  He  seemed  to  see  everything.  His 
quick  eyes  caught,  as  he  rode  along,  a  thousand  in- 
teresting incidents  of  animal  or  insect  life.  The 
woods  v>^ere  not  dull  to  him,  or  to  any  one  with 
him. 

Once,  when  he  was  caught  by  night  in  the  bush, 
and  his  horse  left  him  during  the  night,  and  he  had 
to  trudge  bare-foot  through  the  dawn  some  twenty 
miles,  fasting,  wet,  in  the  rain,  with  fifty  pounds 
of  saddle  and  saddle-bags  on  his  shoulders,  he  saw 
on  the  way  a  good-sized  wowlah,  or  boa,  gorging 
down  a  big  frog.  He  was  very  tired,  he  had  not 
eaten  for  more  than  twenty-four  hours,  he  had  a 
good  deal  of  fever;  but  he  put  his  load  down  and 
stood  by  to  watch  the  snake.  The  old  fellow,  as 
he  said,  was  mighty  slow  about  it.     He  could  not 


224  WILLIAM  STANTON 

wait.  So  he  caught  up  the  snake,  frog  and  all,  and 
staggered  on.  He  got  into  the  Cayo  at  seven 
o'clock,  had  the  church  bell  rung,  and  threw  him- 
self down  for  a  few  minutes'  rest.  The  fever  was 
much  worse.  The  District  Commissioner  heard  the 
bells,  and  said  to  his  wife:  "One  of  the  Fathers 
must  have  come,  and  we  shall  have  Mass."  They 
found  the  Father  a  very  sick  man,  tried  to  persuade 
him  that  he  ought  to  eat  something,  ought  not  to 
say  Mass.  But  the  Father  was  able  to  get  up  laugh- 
ingly and  insist  on  saying  Mass.  "  Why,  it's  Sun- 
day !  "  he  said.  And  he  told  them  about  the  snake, 
which  he  had  tied  to  his  saddle.  Then  he  said 
Mass,  though  at  the  end  he  could  scarcely  stand. 
The  D.  C.  said,  "  What  an  enthusiastic  naturalist !  " 
His  wife  said,  "What  a  zealous  priest!"  We 
might  almost  let  the  story  of  Fr.  Stanton  as  a 
scientist  rest  here;  the  two  sayings  give  you  the 
heart  of  the  matter. 

But  there  are  no  end  of  stories  about  him  and 
his  snakes.  He  was  as  great  a  "  snake  doctor  "  to 
the  Indians  of  Benque  Vie  jo  and  the  District  as  he 
had  formerly  been  to  the  Creoles  and  Caribs. 
Often,  if  they  came  across  a  big  snake  near  the 
town,  or  near  wherever  he  chanced  to  be,  instead 


THE  SCIENTIST  225 

of  killing  it,  they  ran  to  tell  him,  so  that  if  he 
wished,  he  might  capture  it  alive. 

He  came  into  his  garden  at  Benque  Viejo  one 
day,  holding  by  the  tail  a  very  angry  snake,  so 
long  that  with  uplifted  arm  he  could  just  keep  its 
head  off  the  ground.  He  called  out  to  Fr.  Henne- 
man,  "  Get  one  of  those  cleft  sticks,  and  catch 
his  head!"  "Is  he  poisonous?"  Fr.  Henne- 
man  asked  repeatedly;  but  Fr.  Stanton  merely 
kept  telling  him  to  get  a  stick  and  hold  down  its 
head.  When  they  had  secured  the  snake,  and  Fr. 
Stanton  was  examining  its  jaws,  Fr.  Henneman 
again  asked,  "Is  he  poisonous?"  And  this  time 
he  got  an  answer,  given  with  a  grin  — "  Why, 
that's  just  what  I  wanted  to  see!  .  .  .  Yes,  he  is!  " 

With  snakes  he  was  particularly  fearless,  though 
he  seemed  never  to  be  much  bothered  by  fear  of 
anything,  for  that  matter.  He  gave  one  the  im- 
pression of  being  quite  familiar  and  on  easy  terms 
with  most  beasts.  Now  and  then  he  got  paid  out 
for  his  familiarity.  He  was  riding,  one  day,  along 
a  bush-path,  when  he  met  an  ant-bear.  The  animal 
sat  up  in  the  path,  undaunted,  and  faced  him.  He 
dismounted,  eyed  the  chap  a  while,  and  decided  to 
bring  him  home  alive  that  he  might  study  his  ways. 


226  WILLIAM  STANTON 

The  little  ant-bear,  which  is  about  four  feet  long, 
with  a  great,  bushy  tail  more  than  half  as  long  as 
its  body,  reared  like  a  real  bear,  claws  out.  Fr. 
Stanton  sparred  with  him,  as  if  boxing,  then  with 
a  quick  lunge  caught  the  beast's  tail  and  swung  him 
dangling  in  the  air.  With  his  free  hand  he  drew 
his  machete,  and  struck  the  ant-bear  a  smart  blow 
on  the  head  with  the  flat  of  the  blade,  and  stunned 
him.  Then  he  put  him  in  the  empty  corn-sack  and 
fastened  him  securely  to  the  cantle  of  the  saddle. 
Old  Spot,  his  horse,  made  no  objection  whatever. 
He  mounted,  let  the  reins  drop  on  Spot's  neck,  got 
out  his  breviary  and  began  to  read  his  office  as 
he  jogged  along.  Suddenly  Spot  screamed,  and 
reared  almost  straight  in  the  air,  and  pranced  about 
on  two  legs.  With  a  great  deal  of  difficulty,  caught 
as  he  was  between  saddle-bags  behind  and  rifle  in 
front  of  him,  Fr.  Stanton  managed  to  dismount; 
and  with  even  more  difficulty  succeeded  in  calming 
Spot  a  little  —  wondering  all  the  while  what  had 
got  into  the  steady  old  animal.  Of  course,  Mr. 
Ant-bear  had  waked  up,  and  he  had  got  into  old 
Spot.  Reluctantly,  Fr.  Stanton  had  to  kill  the  little 
beast,  and  postpone  his  study  of  live  ant-bears  to  a 
more  favourable  occasion. 

One  scarcely  need   be  told   that   a  good   "  ob- 


THE  SCIENTIST  227 

server  "  must  be  well  endowed  with  patience.  Fr, 
Stanton's  equipment  in  that  respect  was  quite  ex- 
traordinary. Not  merely  had  he  the  quiet  necessary 
to  watch  details  carefully,  and  the  persistence  to  be 
always  on  the  look-out  for  opportunities  of  in- 
vestigation; he  had  that  genuine  "possessing  of 
one's  soul  "  which  is  considerably  more  than  a  mere 
scientist's  endurance.  The  interest  and  fascina- 
tion of  the  work  may  explain  a  scientist's  patience 
with  natural  processes.  But  it  takes,  one  may 
fancy,  a  little  more  than  scientific  interest  to  keep 
one  patient  when  the  natural  processes  are  unmis- 
takably at  one's  own  expense. 

In  the  course  of  his  accumulation  of  wealth  at 
Benque  Viejo,  Fr.  Stanton  became  the  proud  owner 
of  a  chair.  In  no  great  time,  the  so-called  white 
ants,  the  termites,  took  over  the  possession  of  that 
chair  in  their  own  quiet  way.  Without  any  fuss  or 
ostentation,  working  away,  as  they  always  do,  un- 
noticed in  the  central  core  of  the  wood,  they  quietly 
ate  out  everything  of  a  few  legs  of  the  chair  ex- 
cept the  paint.  The  resultant  collapse  of  the  chair 
really  called  for  rather  more  than  scientific  patience. 
But  Fr.  Stanton  gathered  himself  up  from  the  floor, 
and  without  even  a  naughty  word,  but  with  many 
chuckles  instead,  examined  their  craftsmanship,  so 


228  WILLIAM  STANTON 

to  speak,  in  the  most  eager  spirit  of  a  scientific  ob- 
server. It  was  quite  the  same  when  the  "  wee- 
wees,"  an  extremely  ravenous  sort  of  ant,  ate  up 
the  better  part  of  a  tiger  skin  which  he  was  curing 
to  send  home;  ^  or  when  the  same  "  wee- wees  "  in 
one  night  destroyed  some  fruit  trees  that  he  had 
planted  and  was  watching  anxiously  as  an  experi- 
ment. He  had  taken  particular  pains  to  guard  these 
trees,  and  as  a  special  protection  against  "  wee- 
wees  "  had  put  a  thick  ring  of  pine-pitch  around 
the  trunk  of  each  tree.  He  saw  them  green  and 
flourishing  on  one  evening,  and  woke  to  find  them 
utterly  stripped  of  leaves  in  the  morning.  The 
ants  had  decided  that  those  trees  were  about  ready 
for  them,  and  had  come  in  numbers  to  the  feast. 
The  rings  of  pitch  delayed  them  hardly  at  all.  Ant 
number  one  went  up  and  stuck  himself  in  the  pitch, 
ant  number  two  climbed  over  him  and  stuck  be- 
yond; a  score  of  ants  made  a  bridge;  the  bridges 
too  were  scores ;  and  the  army  passed  over  without 
further  trouble.  Fr.  Stanton  was  a  great  deal  more 
delighted  over  the  cleverness  of  the  "  wee-wees  " 
than  he  was  distressed  over  the  loss  of  his  trees. 
But  I  am  afraid  we  are  running  off  the  scientific 

^  He  had  shot  the  tiger,  or  jaguar,  just  outside  his  house, 
where  the  beast  had  come  prowling.  Rather  eloquent  of  the 
intimacy  between  Benque  Viejo  and  the  jungle! 


THE  SCIENTIST  229 

track  altogether  on  this  line  of  thought.  It  could 
hardly  be  science  which  made  him  take  so  cheerfully 
the  uninvited  visit  of  a  neighbour's  bull,  who  came 
one  day  in  his  absence  and  ate  every  living  thing  in 
his  hard-won  garden.  Fr.  Stanton  was  naturally  a 
high-tempered  man,  but  he  only  grinned  when  he 
came  home  to  his  desolate  vegetable  patch,  and  lit  a 
fresh  pipe  and  said,  "  Well,  I  guess  he  needed  it. 
There  isn't  much  decent  pasturage  around  Benque." 
No,  he  did  not  abandon  his  scientific  interest;  it 
remained ;  but  in  the  years  it  had  got  covered  up  by 
a  much  nobler  growth.  In  the  missionary,  it  could 
only  peep  out  here  and  there.  He  did,  indeed,  look 
forward  to  the  possibility  of  doing  something  more 
in  that  line,  when  his  mission  work  had  been  well 
established  and  the  field  of  work  for  souls  better 
manned.  In  the  meantime,  the  only  rather  serious 
work  of  a  scientific  sort  that  he  could  find  time  and 
energy  for  was  the  completion  of  his  notes  begun 
years  before.  This  he  could  do,  and  did,  at  night, 
in  his  little  thatched  hut.  Laboriously,  carefully, 
he  wove  them  into  a  book ;  two  volumes,  on  "  The 
Fauna  of  British  Honduras."  It  was  a  very  ac- 
curate book,  but  popular  in  style,  written  for  the 
general  public  as  well  as  for  scientists.  It  was  com- 
pleted,  ready   for   the   printer,   but   it   was   never 


230  WILLIAM  STANTON 

printed.  It  was  merely  lost.  That  is  all  we  can 
say  of  it. 

Perhaps  only  one  thing  more  need  be  mentioned 
in  this  brief  chapter :  his  notable  generosity  in  shar- 
ing with  others  the  results  of  his  work  in  science. 
He  had  very  little  indeed  of  the  vanity  which  we 
may  suppose  scientists,  in  common  with  other  men, 
to  possess.  None  of  his  work  was  done  to  gain 
praise;  though  he  accepted  the  encouragement  of 
praise  when  it  came,  as  simply  as  a  child.  Pro- 
vided the  work  was  done,  it  mattered  very  little  to 
him  who  got  the  credit  for  it.  His  collections, 
notes,  and  the  like,  he  placed  freely  at  the  disposal 
of  any  one  who  asked  his  assistance.  Of  this  many 
instances  might  be  specified. 

But  in  reality  the  scientific  days  were  done  when 
he  returned  to  British  Honduras.  It  might  seem 
as  if  God  had  accepted  with  a  strangely  complete 
literalness  the  sacrifice  he  had  made  in  relinquishing 
his  splendid  opportunities  for  entomological  and 
other  scientific  work  in  Manila.  He  came  as  God's 
knight  to  the  mission,  on  a  chivalrous  quest  for 
souls.  It  was  as  if  at  the  touch  of  the  accolade  all 
lesser  distinctions  fell  from  him.  Souls  God  gave 
him ;  He  gave  him  a  fine  part  in  His  own  work ;  per- 
haps part  of  the  price  to  be  paid  for  that  was  even 


THE  SCIENTIST  231 

the  very  odd  loss  of  his  scientific  book.  Perhaps 
God  wished  that  the  memory  of  Fr.  Stanton,  with 
us  who  knew  him,  should  be  supremely  that  of  a 
priest :  a  clean  fierce  flame,  in  which  there  was  not 
even  the  colouring  of  earthly  matter. 


CHAPTER  XIV 

The  year  1908  swung  on  to  its  close,  with  the 
usual  round  of  quiet  work.  His  new  comrade,  Fr. 
Versavel,  not  yet  quite  acclimatized,  had  to  go  down 
to  Belize  for  about  a  month,  leaving  him  alone  dur- 
ing the  Christmas  season.  In  his  letter  home  for 
Christmas  he  mentions  this  illness  of  his  compnaion 
with  sympathy,  and  rather  marvels  a  little  that  he 
himself  has  been  so  wonderfully  favoured  in  the 
matter  of  health.  To  read  the  letter,  one  would 
think  that  he  had  never  had  a  day  of  illness  in  his 
three  years  at  Benque  Viejo.  "  Thank  God,  who 
has  given  me  such  a  vigorous  constitution,  I  have 
been  as  well  here,  and  am  in  as  good  health  to-day, 
after  more  than  three  years,  as  I  have  ever  been  in 
my  life."  Of  course,  it  is  just  a  passing  reference; 
except  as  matter  for  gratitude,  the  question  of  his 
health  does  not  occur  to  him  at  all. 

Christmas  in  Benque  Viejo  is  a  busy  time,  but 
not  very  edifying.  The  town  is  full  of  chicleros, 
"  who  come  in  from  the  bush  now  to  spend  a  month 
or  more  in  beastly  drunkenness  until  they  go  out 

232 


VIA  DOLOROSA  233 

again  to  their  work  of  bleeding  the  chicle  trees  to 
supply  Americans  with  chewing  gum."  The  ter- 
mites have  been  eating  up  everything  but  the  tin- 
opener  and  his  machete;  they  balk  at  metal  only. 
He  is  going  out  on  his  rounds  again  after  the  holi- 
days. It  is  a  tired  letter,  cheerful  enough,  but 
rather  dull;  but  he  does  not  say  he  is  tired.  Just 
keep  on  praying  for  his  work;  that  is  the  main 
thing ;  that  comes  back  again  and  again. 

His  rounds  took  him  all  the  way  to  San  Jose. 
When  he  returned  in  February,  he  wrote  that  it  had 
been  "  a  stiff  trip,  soaking  wet  nearly  all  the  time  — 
had  to  swim  across  a  swift  river  with  boots  and 
clothes  on  —  all  day  in  the  saddle,  wet  —  caught 
one  night  in  the  jungle,  in  a  swamp,  pitch  dark, 
knee  deep  in  mud,  raining  all  the  time.  The  horse 
could  not  get  a  step  further.  So  both  of  us,  plas- 
tered with  mud  and  drenched  from  above,  passed 
the  long  night  till  daylight  showed  where  we  were. 
Clouds  of  mosquitos  and  swarms  of  fiery  ants  had 
taken  their  fill  of  me,  whilst  the  blood-sucking  vam- 
pire bats  had  tapped  my  poor  horse.  We  got  out 
all  right,  and  I  had  the  consolation  of  being  told 
by  the  first  Indian  I  met  that  three  big  tigers 
(jaguars)  had  been  killed  near  by  during  the  last 
month.  ...  I  shall  be  going  the  same  round  again 


234  WILLIAM  STANTON 

next  month,  but  then  the  trails  will  be  better,  as  the 
dry  season  is  beginning.  .  .  .  Sunday  is  the  28th  — 
thirty-nine  years  old !  Just  to  think !  I  can  hardly 
realize  it.  It  does  not  seem  so  long  since  we  used 
to  have  the  candy-pullings  on  that  day.  .  .  ." 

And  he  goes  on  cheerfully  with  his  plans.  He  is 
going  to  raise  ducks,  Indian  Runners,  if  they  will 
send  him  some  eggs!  Can  it  be  done?  Would 
they  survive  in  the  post?  But  there  is  something 
wanting  in  the  letter.  He  does  not  say,  "  My 
health,  thank  God,  is  splendid ! "  It  is  significant. 
Indeed,  he  will  never  say  it  again.  The  nearest  he 
can  get  to  it  will  be  one  rather  feeble,  "  Otherwise 
my  health  is  splendid."  Not  that  he  complains,  not 
yet.  He  admitted  to  one  or  two  who  noted  his 
rather  drawn  look  that  he  was  not  feeling  very  well. 
But,  of  course,  it  is  nothing  serious;  it  would  be 
ridiculous  to  mention  it  in  a  letter. 

He  set  out  in  March  on  another  long  journey.  It 
was  in  the  dry  season.  Travelling  should  have 
been  easier.  But  somehow,  it  did  not  seem  to  be. 
He  had  no  opportunity  to  write  during  that  time; 
but  he  told  the  writer,  in  a  puzzled  way,  that  that 
particular  San  Jose  trip  seemed  to  bristle  with  diffi- 
culties. He  got  lost  rather  badly  a  few  times. 
Once  he  had  to  chop  a  path  with  his  machete  for 


VIA  DOLOROSA  235 

four  or  five  hours,  going  ahead  and  leading  his 
horse;  and  the  tangle  of  bush  tliat  they  went 
through  rubbed  off  his  blanket  and  shot-bag  from 
the  saddle;  his  breviary  and  knife  and  pipe  and 
tobacco  were  in  the  shot-bag.  He  had  to  sleep  out 
in  the  bush  a  couple  of  nights.  The  commissary 
department  was  unusually  inefficient.  In  addition, 
he  "  did  not  feel  very  well."  In  fact,  he  believed  he 
must  have  rheumatism,  because  he  had  dreadful 
pains  in  his  back. 

That  last  was  a  first  hint.  Of  course,  he  said  it 
with  the  old  grin,  and  joked  about  it.  It  was  im- 
possible for  any  one  to  take  alarm  at  the  matter,  the 
way  he  put  it.  It  was,  he  made  one  feel,  just  an- 
other bit  of  the  humour  of  the  bush;  part  of  the 
good-natured  "  cussedness "  of  things,  which  so 
often  sees  to  it  that  "  it  never  rains  but  it  pours." 
One  scarcely  thought  to  ask  him  if  the  pains  still 
continued.  He  did  look  rather  wretched  —  but 
then,  he  had  been  working  very  hard. 

He  got  back  to  Benque  Viejo  in  the  beginning 
of  April.  His  companion  had  returned  from  Be- 
lize. There  was  a  third  Father  in  the  District  now, 
with  headquarters  at  the  Cayo.  He  was  delighted. 
Everything  was  going  splendidly.  The  District 
was  really  beginning  to  round  into  shape.     They 


236  WILLIAM  STANTON 

would  do  wonders  now,  the  three  of  them.  In  the 
meantime,  he  must  get  at  that  garden  and  pasture 
again.  The  weeds  were  getting  up.  It  was  hard 
to  keep  things  going  when  one  had  to  be  away  in 
the  bush  so  much  of  the  time.  Besides,  a  little 
work  would  do  his  rheumatism  good.  Yes,  he  still 
had  a  little  pain  in  his  back.  Then,  suddenly,  on 
April  13,  1909,  comes  this  note  to  home,  scrawled 
in  pencil : 

".  .  .  Just  at  present  I  am  on  the  flat  of  my  back  in 
bed,  with  an  attack  of  something,  apparently  acute 
articular  rheumatism.  The  seat  of  the  trouble  seems 
to  be  pretty  well  down  the  spine,  at  the  articulations  of 
the  hip  bones.  Though  I  had  felt  some  pain  and  sore- 
ness before,  about  ten  days  ago  it  struck  me  fiercely 
whilst  I  was  bending  down  to  bind  some  plants  in  the 
pasture.  The  shooting  pain  was  unbearable.  I  simply 
squirmed  on  the  ground  and  screeched  like  a  wild  In- 
dian till  it  passed.  It  took  me  about  fifteen  minutes, 
with  great  pain  and  difficulty,  to  get  to  my  feet.  I  got 
to  the  house,  where  I  have  been  since,  unable  to  do 
anything.  There  is  no  doctor  here,  of  course,  but  we 
have  sent  word  to  Belize  to  the  medico  there  and  shall 
get  some  advice  by  next  week's  mail. 

"  Thank  God,  the  thing  is  improving  slowly,  and  with 
great  care  I  can  move  a  bit  in  bed  without  getting  an- 
other attack.  I  trust  that  in  a  few  days  more  I  can 
get  to  my  feet  and  be  about.  Otherwise  I  am  in  splen- 
did health  —  no  fever. 

".  .  .  For  over  three  years  and  a  half,  working  in 


VIA  DOLOROSA  237 

these  jungles,  I  have  had  perfect  health,  so  I  can't 
complain  when  the  Lord  sends  me  some  little  pain  to 
remind  me  I  am  human. 

"  I  am  getting  tired  trying  to  write  on  my  back,  so 
must  say  good-bye  for  a  while.  Pray  that  the  Lord 
may  put  me  on  my  feet  quickly  and  give  me  strength 
to  work  many  years  more  for  His  glory.  .  .  ." 

How  much  torture  there  was  in  those  last  few 
expeditions  through  the  bush,  one  may  fairly  guess 
from  this  simple  letter.  If  he  said  little  or  nothing 
about  it  before,  it  was  from  no  petty  vanity,  it  was 
not  out  of  the  braggadocio  with  which  strong  men 
often  mask  any  physical  weakness.  He  was  in  this, 
as  in  all  things,  most  simple  and  honest.  Any 
swaggering  assumption  of  callousness  or  indiffer- 
ence was  impossible  to  a  man  of  his  character  and 
humour.  He  merely  did  not  think  much  of  pain  or 
discomfort,  did  not  dwell  upon  it  in  his  own  mind, 
and  never  let  it  affect  at  all  the  resolute  working  of 
his  will.  That  was  why  he  kept  silent  concerning 
his  pain  and  distress.  When  they  forced  his  atten- 
tion unmistakably,  and  'he  realized  that  this  was  no 
common  discomfort  of  his  hard  life,  then  he  spoke 
out  plainly.  There  is  a  world  of  humility  in  the 
man  who  writes  simply  that  he  "  squirmed  on  the 
ground  and  screeched  like  a  wild  Indian "  with 
pain. 


238  WILLIAM  STANTON 

The  advice  came  from  the  doctor  in  BeHze  "  by 
the  next  week's  mail,"  and  was,  of  course,  a  sensible 
order  for  Fr.  Stanton  to  come  down  to  Belize  at 
once  and  put  himself  in  his  hands.  But  there  was 
so  much  to  do.  Besides,  he  had  to  begin  plans  for 
his  new  house ;  which  was  much  needed.  Then,  this 
was  the  dry  season ;  no  launch  could  get  up  the 
river;  he  must  go  on  horseback  or  in  a  dorey. 
Anyway,  his  back  really  was  better.  Perhaps  it  all 
came  from  the  Rains.  But  his  superior  added  his 
urging  to  that  of  the  doctor,  and  six  weeks  later, 
at  the  end  of  May  he  went  down,  on  horseback.  It 
took  him  four  days,  but  he  had  to  sleep  in  the  bush 
only  once  on  the  way ;  and  that  under  circumstances 
that  amused  him.  He  had  hoped  to  make  the  ranch 
of  a  good  Protestant  friend  before  nightfall.  But 
night  caught  him  still  at  some  distance,  he  could  not 
tell  just  how  far,  from  the  place.  He  was  in  con- 
siderable pain,  which  may  have  muddled  his  wits. 
Suddenly  he  heard  through  the  night  the  loud  bray 
of  an  ass  belonging  to  his  friend's  ranch.  Obvi- 
ously, he  was  near  the  place.  But  in  which  direc- 
tion ?  The  jungle  makes  it  hard  to  locate  the  source 
of  sounds.  Was  he  on  the  right  side  of  the  river? 
Was  he  near  the  river,  or  away  from  it  ?  He  could 
not  settle  how  to  go ;  so  he  did  what  is,  in  the  cir- 


FATHER    STANTON,    liELIZE,    IQOQ 


VIA  DOLOROSA  '239 

cumstances,  the  most  sensible  thing  to  do  in  the 
bush:  he  unsaddled  his  horse  and  lay  down  where 
he  was.  Morning  showed  him  his  friend's  place 
just  across  the  river  from  where  he  had  passed  the 
night.  A  hail  would  have  brought  a  boat  and 
lights.  "  There  we  were,"  he  said,  "  a  braying  ass 
on  one  side  of  the  river,  and  a  bray-less  ass  on  the 
other;  and  we  couldn't  get  together !  " 

No  one  took  his  illness  very  seriously;  least  of 
all  did  he.  Rheumatism  was  the  common  lay  ver- 
dict. The  doctor  made  another  guess.  In  the 
meantime,  Fr.  Stanton  was  resting  by  pushing  on 
his  plans  and  preparations  for  his  new  house.  On 
June  4,  1909,  he  wrote  to  his  aunt: 

"  Just  a  line  to-day,  to  reassure  you  about  my  health. 
I  am  all  right  again,  the  pain  in  my  back  almost  entirely 
gone  —  as  you  may  easily  imagine,  since  I  have  just 
come  down  from  Benque  to  Belize  on  horseback,  a 
four  days'  ride,  to  see  the  doctor.  On  examination  he 
told  me  immediately  what  was  the  matter:  injury  of  the 
main  sciatic  nerve  from  the  pressure  of  a  rather  dilapi- 
dated truss  that  I  have  been  wearing.  In  a  few  days 
more  I  shall  be  as  good  as  new  again. 

"  I  am  busy  working  out  plans,  etc.,  for  a  civilized 
house  at  Benque.  It  is  going  to  be  a  big  job,  but  I 
hope  to  finish  it  this  year.  The  main  timbers  I  have 
already  got  out  of  the  forest,  but  most  of  the  rest  of 
the  material  will  have  to  be  transported  from 
Belize.  .  .  ." 


240  WILLIAM  STANTON 

He  remained  in  Belize  four  or  five  weeks.  The 
doctor  was  rather  baffled  by  his  case.  He  needed 
an  X-ray  examination  to  make  certain  how  his  spine 
was  affected ;  and  Belize  did  not  possess  a  Roentgen 
apparatus.  Fr.  Stanton  insisted  he  was  feeling 
better ;  the  thing,  whatever  it  was,  would  pass  away ; 
he  must  get  back  to  his  mission  and  his  new  house. 
The  new  house  was  a  real  venture;  but  Mother 
Katharine  Drexel  had  come  to  his  aid  with  a 
generous  donation;  and  his  relatives,  and  friends, 
in  the  States  and  in  Belize,  contributed  more.  He 
did  very  little  begging  —  a  task  for  which  he  had  no 
liking,  of  course.  Nor  did  he  need  to  beg  much; 
those  who  knew  him  were  glad  to  help  him;  and 
with  his  usual  nonchalance  in  money  matters  he  was 
perfectly  content  to  trust  Providence  to  any  extent. 
He  had  laid  out  his  orders  for  material  by  the  end 
of  June,  and  he  was  eager  to  get  back  home.  On 
July  4,  he  wrote  to  one  of  his  comrades  in  the  Cayo 
District : 

".  .  .  My  back  is  all  right,  that  is,  it  scarcely  bothers 
me  at  all  now.  All  it  needs  is  a  little  rest,  which  it  is 
getting  to  its  full  satisfaction  here  in  Belize,  much  to 
the  Doc's  satisfaction  too.  I  can't  easily  stand  a  pit- 
pan  trip  of  eight  days  just  at  present,  but  if  you  fellows 
don't  pray  for  high  water  up  the  river,  I'm  afraid  I 
shall  have  to  make  a  break  for  the  bush  in  pitpan, 


VIA  DOLOROSA  241 

dorey,  or  *  walk-foot.'  For  I  will  not  hang  around 
here  more  than  a  week  longer  at  the  most. 

"  You  must  be  hard  up  for  provisions  by  this  time. 
If  something  doesn't  turn  up  within  a  very  few  days,  I 
shall  try  to  shove  something  along  by  pitpan  if  possible 
and  run  the  risks.  .  .  . 

"  Just  met  Willie  Stewart  at  Melhado's,  and  he  tells 
me  The  Cutter  is  going  to  try  to  get  up  this  week.  If 
so,  I  think  Fr.  Wallace  and  I  shall  try  to  get  passage. 

"  But  it  is  breakfast  hour  in  Belize  now  —  I  cannot 
give  you  any  more  definite  arrangements,  as  the  mail 
is  about  to  close.  .  .  ." 

Evidently,  the  men  up  country  did  not  pray  hard 
enough.  The  Rains  had  begun,  but  the  river  rose 
very  slowly.  No  launch  would  venture  as  yet  into 
its  upper  reaches.  It  might  be  a  week,  it  might  be 
two  weeks  or  more,  before  the  flood  would  be  high 
enough  for  that.  So  the  Superior  of  the  mission 
and  Fr.  Stanton  loaded  a  pitpan  with  tinned  pro- 
visions, flour,  etc.,  and  set  out  on  the  journey. 

The  only  way  to  understand  the  discomfort  of  a 
long  voyage  in  a  pitpan  is  to  make  such  a  voyage. 
Fancy  a  flat-bottomed  craft,  fashioned  of  two  great 
logs  hollowed  out  and  joined  together;  some  thirty 
to  forty  feet  long,  three  to  four  feet  wide ;  square- 
ended,  of  very  shallow  draft,  the  bottom  sloping 
up  at  bow  and  stern  so  as  to  glide  smoothly  over 
the  water.     It  is  loaded  amidships  with  a  huge  pile 


242  WILLIAM  STANTON 

of  goods,  leaving  only  a  small  space  forward  for 
the  paddlers  and  a  still  smaller  space  at  the  stern 
for  the  luckless  passengers.  Its  high  load  makes  it 
crank;  capsizes  are  distressingly  common.  One 
must  sit  quietly,  as  the  craft  lurches  and  staggers 
up  against  the  current.  There  is  scarcely  room  for 
one  to  change  position.  Standing  or  moving  about 
is  utterly  out  of  the  question.  In  the  rapid  shallows 
the  crew  stand  up  to  pole;  in  the  swifter,  narrow 
reaches  of  the  river,  where  the  water  tumbles  and 
boils  amongst  the  rocks,  they  must  take  a  line  ahead, 
make  it  fast  to  a  tree  on  the  bank,  and  drag  the  pit- 
pan  slowly  forward.  It  is  in  such  places  that 
cargoes  are  lost.  Let  the  current  catch  them  but  a 
moment  broadside  on,  and  over  goes  the  pitpan. 

Eight  weary  days  of  this  they  had  before  they 
reached  the  Cayo.  They  had  no  awning;  the  sun 
beat  down  upon  them,  the  sudden,  torrential  rains 
drenched  them.  Seven  nights  they  slept  in  the  pit- 
pan,  cramped,  without  room  enough  to  stretch  out; 
only  one  night  they  got  ashore  and  slept  in  an 
abandoned  hut.  Their  food  gave  out,  mysteriously 
enough,  for  they  had  put  sufficient  rations  aboard 
at  starting.  The  crew  mutinied.  They  had  to 
beg  provisions  from  little  planters  along  the 
river. 


VIA  DOLOROSA  243 

Fr,  Stanton  bore  the  journey  badly.  The  pain  in 
his  back  grew  worse,  as  he  had  to  admit  to  his  com- 
panion. But  he  did  not  complain.  He  joked  about 
it,  he  kept  wonderfully  cheerful.  If  a  sharper 
spasm  brought  a  groan  to  his  lips,  the  groan  ended 
in  a  grinning  burlesque.  He  would  be  all  right  as 
soon  as  they  got  out  of  that  blooming  Pullman.  He 
was  going  right  into  his  garden  the  moment  they  got 
to  Benque,  and  he  was  not  going  to  sit  down  for  a 
month.  The  old  back  needed  exercise,  that  was  all ; 
a  daily  dose  of  hoe  and  machete. 

They  had  not  dared  to  open  any  of  their  boxes  of 
provisions  during  the  journey  —  for  fear  they  might 
disappear  altogether.  The  danger  of  capsizing  was 
not  at  any  time  the  only  risk  goods  ran  in  transit  by 
pitpan.  When  they  reached  the  Cayo,  they  ar- 
ranged for  mules  to  carry  their  goods  to  Benque 
Viejo.  But  even  between  the  Cayo  and  Benque 
there  might  be  strange  vanishings.  A  note  of  July 
20,  to  the  Father  at  the  Cayo,  is  typical  of  a  score  of 
notes  on  similar  occasions : 

".  .  .  Feliciano  says  you  looked  for  milk  amongst 
my  goods  and  could  not  find  any.  I  myself  saw 
amongst  my  boxes  at  Chindo's  at  least  one  case  of 
evaporated  milk.  I  didn't  open  the  box  to  see  if  there 
was  actually  anything  in  it,  but  it  looked  all  right,  and 


244  WILLIAM  STANTON 

it  is  on  the  bill.  If  you  can't  find  it,  try  to  buy  a  few 
tins  of  any  kind  of  milk  to  bring  out  with  you  when  you 
come  Friday,  as  we  have  run  out  entirely.  .  .  ." 

The  pain  in  his  back  never  left  him,  but  now  it 
was  not  so  intense,  and  besides,  as  he  said,  he  was 
getting  used  to  it.  His  notes  and  letters  of  the  next 
few  months  make  no  mention  of  it  at  all.  He  is 
busy  with  plans  for  his  house,  with  getting  his  gar- 
den into  shape  again,  with  the  routine  of  work 
amongst  his  people.  In  the  beginning  of  September 
he  even  gets  up  a  party,  at  the  request  of  the  Dis- 
trict Commissioner,  to  inspect  some  Maya  ruins 
near  by. 

The  Government  had  lately  appointed  a  surgeon 
for  the  Caya  District,  a  young  Englishman  who 
promptly  became  a  close  friend  of  Fr.  Stanton,  and 
of  course  gave  him  his  professional  services.  He 
could  not  make  sure  of  his  ailment,  with  the  limited 
facilities  at  his  command,  and  from  the  start  he 
urged  him  to  go  to  the  States  for  more  adequate  ex- 
amination and  treatment.  But  Fr.  Stanton  pooh- 
poohed  that  idea.  There  was  nothing  seriously 
wrong,  he  was  sure.  And  then,  there  was  so  much 
work  to  do.  It  was  simply  impossible  even  to  think 
of  leaving  Benque.  His  companion  remonstrated 
with  him  for  working  so  hard  — and  to  his  astonish- 


VIA  DOLOROSA  245 

ment,  was  sharply  rebuked.  It  was  the  only  time 
Fr.  Stanton  had  even  momentarily  lost  his  temper 
with  one  of  his  comrades.  But  his  companion  did 
not  misunderstand;  he  saw  in  the  fact  only  a  new 
symptom  of  the  now  ancient  ailment.  The  man's 
nerves  were  showing  the  strain  of  long  months  of 
suffering.  He  was  tough  and  enduring,  he  would 
not  give  up,  but  the  pain  was  cornering  him. 

In  the  second  week  of  September  he  had  to  go  to 
the  Cayo  on  business.  It  was  during  the  Rains,  and 
of  course  the  road  was  in  its  usual  horrible  condi- 
tion. His  horse  could  not  carry  him  through  the 
mud,  and  he  had  to  dismount  and  flounder  along 
behind,  holding  to  the  horse's  tail.  A  week  later 
he  writes  to  the  Father  at  the  Cayo : 

"  I  have  been  all  knocked  out  since  Sunday.  .  .  . 
Only  a  little  malaria,  says  the  Doctor,  and  I  am  nearly 
over  it  now.  It's  '  el  mal  que  anda.'  Doc  says  I  must 
keep  quiet  for  a  few  days  more  —  hard  thing  —  and 
I'm  filling  up  with  quinine. 

"  I  got  out  safely  last  week,  at  just  9:00  p.m.  Old 
Brownie  led  the  way  in  the  dark,  and  with  a  good  grip 
at  the  end  of  his  tail  I  was  guided  slowly  along  the 
road.  .  .  ." 

That  is  all  he  has  to  say  about  himself.  The  note 
goes  on  with  directions  about  some  goods  that  are 
expected  from  Belize,  messages  about  some  plants 


246  WILLIAM  STANTON 

he  is  to  get  from  a  man  at  the  Cayo,  about  lumber 
for  the  new  house,  and  the  Hke.  His  hurried  notes 
home  do  not  even  mention  his  illness.  Only  on 
October  6,  in  a  brief  apology  for  not  writing  more, 
does  he  refer  to  the  matter  at  all : 

".  .  .  Am  still  alone,  and  extremely  busy.  Besides, 
have  been  somewhat  unwell  for  the  past  month,  but 
nothing  serious.  Am  feeling  somewhat  better  these 
days.  Plenty  of  trouble  trying  to  build  a  house  back 
here  in  the  bush. 

"  Hope  to  be  myself  next  week,  and  shall  write  more 
details  of  my  work.     Love  to  all." 

In  the  meantime  his  superior  in  Belize  had  written 
him  to  come  down  and  see  the  doctor  there  again; 
he  was  worried  about  him.  But  Fr.  Stanton  was 
unable  to  make  the  journey  until  the  middle  of  Octo- 
ber. Then  he  went  down  on  horseback,  and  nearly 
collapsed  when  he  reached  Belize.  Still  his  courage 
and  cheerfulness  deceived  every  one.  It  was  im- 
possible to  believe  that  there  was  anything  seriously 
the  matter.  The  doctor  was  as  puzzled  as  the  Cayo 
surgeon  had  been.  Lacking  an  X-ray  examination, 
his  various  diagnoses  were  only  guesses  in  the  dark. 
The  one  obvious  thing  was  that  Fr.  Stanton  was  in 
constant  pain,  and  that  his  wiry  strength  was  wear- 
ing down.     The  doctor  again  urged  a  voyage  back 


VIA  DOLOROSA  247 

to  the  States.  But  the  new  house  at  Benque  was 
actually  begun;  he  couldn't  go  now.  He  remained 
only  a  week  in  Belize,  more  occupied  and  concerned 
even  then  with  business  affairs  than  with  the  doctor's 
conjectures  as  to  what  ailed  him.  The  day  before 
his  return,  he  wrote  a  long  letter  to  his  sister,  full 
of  talk  about  the  new  house,  in  the  course  of  which 
he  says : 

".  .  .  To  tell  the  truth,  I  have  not  had  quite  my 
usual  strength  and  health  since  last  March,  but  thank 
God,  I  believe  I  am  all  right  again  now.  My  great 
trouble  now  is  worry  about  the  building  of  our  new 
house.  .  .  . 

".  .  .  It  is  late,  and  I  must  be  packing  my  saddle- 
bags to  start  early  in  the  morning  on  my  journey  back 
to  the  bush.  I  shall  probably  reach  Benque  by  next 
Sunday.  .  .  ." 

The  writer  rode  out  with  him  a  bit  on  his  way 
back,  and  saw  his  face  twisted  with  pain.  But  he 
said  it  was  no  great  matter,  and  chatted  cheerfully, 
and  made  plans  for  a  great  exploring  expedition 
that  they  two  would  undertake  when  the  dry  season 
came  again.  With  three  priests  now  in  the  Cayo 
District,  he  thought  he  could  get  off  for  a  few  weeks 
to  have  a  look  through  the  unexplored  hinterland  of 
the  Colony.  He  had  hopes  of  finding  open  country, 
good  pasturage,  perhaps  lakes,   in  that  no-man's 


248  WILLIAM  STANTON 

land.  They  would  carry  a  transit-compass,  perhaps 
gather  data  for  a  future  railroad.  They  would  map 
the  country.  By  that  time  he  surely  would  be  quite 
strong  again.  They  parted,  and  he  rode  on  between 
the  tangle  of  mangrove  with  his  hand  at  his  back 
and  a  little  unsteady  in  the  saddle. 

The  man's  pluck  was  indomitable.  Four  days' 
ride  brought  him  to  Benque.  He  stayed  a  few  days, 
to  attend  to  his  people  there ;  then  he  set  off,  Rains 
and  all,  on  the  round  of  his  pueblos.  He  had  been 
reproaching  himself,  when  in  Belize,  for  having 
neglected  them  so  long.  Hearing  him  talk,  one 
would  think  it  had  been  only  preoccupation  with  his 
new  house  that  had  kept  him  away  from  his  other 
work.  Apparently,  the  fact  that  he  had  been  unwell 
never  entered  his  mind  as  an  excuse.  How  dreary 
was  that  long  journey  to  the  sick  man,  we  may  only 
conjecture.  We  have  no  details  of  it.  It  lasted 
about  a  month.  It  was  in  the  worst  season  of  the 
year.     On  December  2,  1909,  he  writes  to  his  aunt: 

**  I  am  just  back  from  one  of  my  trips  amongst  the 
smaller  Indian  villages  of  the  district,  and  am  some- 
what tired  out,  but  it  is  mail  day  and  if  I  don't  write 
to-day  I  may  not  be  able  to  get  off  any  Christmas  letter. 
Let  me  begin  by  wishing  you  and  all  the  family  a 
Merry  Christmas  and  a  New  Year  filled  with  the 
choicest  blessings  of  the  new-born  Babe  of  Bethlehem. 


VIA  DOLOROSA  249 

"  How  time  does  fly !  More  than  four  years  have 
passed  since  I  came  back  here  into  the  wilds  of  the 
Cayo  bush,  and  still  I  am  alive  and  well,  and  still  able 
to  work  —  thanks  to  the  good  God  who  has  protected 
me  from  a  thousand  dangers  of  body  and  soul.  .  .  . 

That  is  the  tone  of  the  whole  letter,  a  marvelling 
gratitude.  There  have  been  difficulties,  but  God 
brought  himself  and  his  companions  through  them. 
He  praises  the  courage  and  generosity  of  his  com- 
panions.    God  has  been  so  good  to  them  all. 

",  .  .  Pray  for  us,"  he  concludes,  "  That  the  Lord 
may  give  us  strength  and  zeal  to  work  hard  for  His 
glory  and  the  salvation  of  the  poor  souls  buried  in  these 
wildernesses.  The  difficulties  are  great,  but  the  Lord 
is  greater  than  all.  .  .  ." 

Not  a  word  about  ill-health.  Not  even  any  good- 
humoured  chat  about  the  last  trip.  He  is  "  some- 
what tired  out,"  that  is  all.  Well,  he  was  more 
"  tired  out "  than  he  knew.  It  was  his  last  round 
of  the  mission  stations. 

On  December  14  he  wrote  a  very  jolly  letter  to 
Belize.  He  is  still  enthusiastic  about  that  exploring 
expedition  for  the  next  dry  season.  He  is  sending 
down  "  a  fine  skin  of  a  tigrillo,  shot  just  outside  our 
fence;  also  a  skin  of  a  large  boa-constrictor.  We 
are  just  lying  in  wait  these  nights   for  another 


250  WILLIAM  STANTON 

tigrillo,  that  carried  off  three  hens  and  a  chick  the 
other  night  from  our  next-door  neighbour.  .  .  ." 
After  more  small  talk  about  affairs  in  Benque,  and 
the  new  house,  the  letter  concludes : 

".  .  .  Perhaps  I  shall  bring  those  skins  down  my- 
self. ...  It  seems  I  am  doomed  for  another  trip  to 
Belize  —  doctor's  orders.  There  seem  to  be  a  few 
screws  still  loose  in  my  spinal  column,  and  Doc  says 
there  is  no  monkey  wrench  in  Benque  that  can  tighten 
them  up.  He  prescribes  at  least  ten  hours  a  day 
stretched  on  the  flat  of  my  back  —  just  think !  Well, 
I  am  on  the  flat  of  my  back  at  the  present  moment,  and 
this  must  serve  as  excuse  for  this  horrible  scrib- 
ble. .  .  ." 

But  he  actually  got  up  on  Christmas  day,  and  said 
Mass  for  his  people.  It  cost  him  great  effort;  the 
pain  was  intense;  he  could  get  through  only  one 
Mass.  His  companion  found  him  afterward  in 
their  hut,  with  tears  in  his  eyes  that  he  could  not  say 
his  three  Masses  on  Christmas  day.  The  next  day 
he  wrote  to  his  aunt : 

"  Just  a  line  to  let  you  know  I  am  alive  and  that  I 
received  your  Christmas  letter.  .  .  . 

"  As  for  myself,  I  must  confess  that  I  am  stretched 
on  the  flat  of  my  back  at  present.  The  doctor  of  the 
District  has  examined  me  several  times,  and  says  that 
a  couple  of  segments  of  my  spinal  column  have  rotated 


VIA  DOLOROSA  251 

out  of  their  normal  position  and  that  there  appears  to 
be  a  renal  tumour  in  my  left  side.  This  can  only  be 
determined,  he  says,  by  thorough  examination  under 
the  X-rays  —  which  cannot  be  done  in  the  colony. 

"  At  any  rate,  I  am  going  to  try  to  get  down  to 
BeHze  this  week,  and  see  what  Fr.  Superior  and  the 
doctors  in  Belize  have  to  say  about  the  case.  The  doc- 
tor here  has  prescribed  that  in  the  meantime  I  keep 
stretched  straight  out  on  my  back  on  a  hard  bed,  as 
much  as  possible.  So  here  I  am.  We  shall  see  what 
the  Lord  has  in  store  for  me  now  —  perhaps  a  few 
weeks'  rest  in  Belize,  perhaps  a  journey  to  St.  Louis, 
or  at  least  as  far  as  New  Orleans  —  who  knows ! 

"  After  I  get  to  Belize,  I  shall  let  you  know  any 
news.  To  lie  about  doing  nothing  is  very  hard ;  but  I 
should  not  complain.  My  hand  is  tired,  writing  in  my 
peculiar  position ;  so  with  a  Happy  New  Year  to  all 
the  dear  ones,  I  shall  say  good-bye  for  a  while.  .  .  ." 

He  came  down  to  Belize,  though  the  journey  was 
torture.  The  doctors  consulted  and  debated  and 
examined,  and  could  not  come  to  any  certain  con- 
clusion, beyond  that  he  must  go  at  once  to  the 
States.  A  new  superior  had  just  come  from  St. 
Louis  to  replace  the  former  superior.  It  was  de- 
cided that  Fr,  Stanton  should  accompany  the  latter 
home.  The  mail  steamer  had  no  room  for  them. 
They  booked  passage  on  a  tramp  bound  for  Mobile, 
to  sail  on  Januar}^  6.  He  had  no  clothes  save  the 
rough  khaki  and  flannels  that  he  wore  in  the  bush, 


252  WILLIAM  STANTON 

and  we  had  to  lend  him  a  collection  of  garments. 
He  made  a  joke  of  trading  his  gun  for  a  coat  with 
one  of  us,  and  so  on.  The  day  before  they  left 
Belize,  he  wrote  his  last  note  to  the  Father  who  was 
to  be  in  charge  of  the  District  in  his  place,  turning 
over  to  him  with  cheerful  heartiness  his  plans  and 
his  responsibilities.  He  was  in  great  pain,  but  he 
wrote  gaily  as  ever : 

"  Well,  old  man,  I  am  off  for  a  while.  The  doctors 
have  ordered  me  to  the  States  by  the  first  steamer,  say 
I  should  go  right  up  to  St.  Louis,  where  they  can  rip 
me  up  without  any  difficulty  and  haul  out  of  my 
anatomy  some  sort  of  cyst,  which  the  Doc  says  prob- 
ably entered  by  means  of  infected  marana.  He  says  I 
may  be  able  to  return  in  about  a  month.  Dios 
quiera !  .  .  ." 

It  is  no  discredit  to  the  doctors  in  Belize,  con- 
sidering the  circumstances,  to  say  that  they  did  not 
know  what  they  were  talking  about ;  but  they  did  not 
know.  The  man's  body  was  ringed  with  a  mon- 
strous growth  of  cancer ;  and  he  was  not  to  return  in 
a  month;  he  was  never  to  return. 


CHAPTER  XV 

This  is  the  last  chapter :  let  us  go  through  with  it 
swiftly:  it  is  a  painful  chapter,  of  the  dragging  tor- 
tures of  one  dying  of  sarcoma.  Yet  one  is  tempted, 
too,  to  delay  upon  it,  for  the  sake  of  the  superhuman 
courage,  the  heart-breaking  gaiety  and  brightness 
with  which  Fr.  Stanton  went  through  these  last 
terrible  months. 

He  and  Fr.  Wallace  sailed  from  Belize  on  Friday, 
January  6.  The  steamer  was  small,  with  meagre 
accommodations  for  passengers.  They  struck  ab- 
normally rough  weather  in  the  Gulf,  bucking  their 
way  through  a  savage  north-easter.  Fr.  Stanton 
was  in  constant  and  dreadful  pain.  Every  sea-voy- 
age had  always  brought  him  a  few  days  of  sickness, 
and  he  dreaded  it  now.  He  begged  his  companion 
to  pray  that  he  might  be  spared  that  additional  dis- 
tress. And  pray  they  did,  with  the  result  that  Fr. 
Wallace,  usually  a  good  sailor,  was  sick  for  two; 
Fr.  Stanton  escaping  entirely.  Their  steamer  came 
into  Mobile  five  days  later,  her  decks  and  masts 
coated  with  ice:  a  strange  phenomenon  for  those 

253 


254  WILLIAM  STANTON 

latitudes,  and  testimony  sufficient  of  the  violence  of 
the  storm  they  had  weathered. 

They  arrived  in  port  at  nine  in  the  evening,  with  a 
prospect  of  having  to  remain  aboard  until  morning. 
But  Fr.  Stanton  was  in  such  bad  shape  that  his 
companion  feared  he  might  die,  and  so  made  vigor- 
ous efforts  to  rout  out  the  collector  of  the  port  and 
get  permission  to  go  ashore  at  once.  They  stopped 
only  a  day  in  Mobile,  as  Fr.  Stanton  insisted  on 
pushing  on  directly  to  St.  Louis.  From  his  bed,  in 
Mobile,  he  wrote  to  his  sister: 

"  Mobile,  Ala.,  Jan  12,  1910. 
"  My  dear  little  sister: 

"  You  are  astonished  to  hear  of  me  in  Mobile ;  but 
here  I  am,  back  for  a  while  at  least  under  the  stars 
and  stripes.  I  arrived  here  about  nine  o'clock  last 
night,  accompanied  by  Fr.  Wallace,  on  the  SS.  Belize, 
after  a  very  rough  passage  from  Belize.  To-night,  at 
8 :40,  we  take  the  train  direct  to  St.  Louis,  and  expect 
to  get  there  Friday  evening. 

"And  what  does  it  all  mean?  Well,  you  will  re- 
member what  I  wrote  in  my  last  letter  from  Benque 
Viejo.  As  soon  as  I  got  down  to  Belize,  and  the  doc- 
tor there  had  examined  my  case  again,  he  told  Fr. 
Superior  to  get  me  off  by  the  first  boat  for  the  States, 
to  have  the  operation  performed  which  alone  could 
cure  me.  Fr.  Wallace,  who  had  just  been  replaced  as 
Superior  of  the  mission  by  Fr.  Mitchell,  was  packing 
up  to  return,  so  we  came  together. 


HOMEWARD  255 

"  You  and  Auntie  must  not  be  frightened  at  this,  as 
the  operation  which  has  to  be  performed  is  not  very 
dangerous,  and  the  doctor  says  that  within  a  month  I 
shall  be  out  of  the  hospital  and  be  as  good  as  new 
again.  They  have  to  cut  out  of  my  side  what  they 
call  a  hydatid  cyst,  which  seems  to  be  the  cause  of  my 
trouble,  and  when  that  is  done  the  twist  in  my  spine 
will  probably  right  itself  gradually.  Pray  that  every- 
thing may  turn  out  well. 

"  '  Man  proposes,  God  disposes,'  but  as  far  as  I  know 
at  present  I  shall  probably  be  on  my  way  back  to 
Belize  and  the  bush  some  time  in  February  or  perhaps 
March.  On  my  return  I  would  naturally  sail  from 
New  Orleans.  I  should  like  of  course  to  go  round 
through  San  Antonio  to  see  you  all  once  again,  but  it 
is  a  good  deal  out  of  the  way,  and  I  don't  know  whether 
the  poor  mission  can  stand  the  extra  expense  after  all 
the  expenses  of  my  journey  and  the  medical  and  hos- 
pital bills.  But  there  is  still  time  to  think  of  such 
things,  and  no  hurry  at  present. 

"  I  shall  of  course  write  promptly  after  getting  to 
St.  Louis,  and  let  you  know  how  I  am  getting  along. 

"  I  feel  half  frozen  to  death  here  in  Mobile  after  my 
years  in  the  tropical  bush.  St.  Louis  must  be  much 
colder.  But  the  doctor  says  I  shall  recuperate  from 
the  operation  much  easier  up  in  St.  Louis  than  further 
south.  ..." 

There  is  not  a  word  about  the  pain  he  was  suffer- 
ing. Indeed,  all  who  dealt  with  him  during  that 
long  time  of  torture  brought  away  an  imperishable 
memory  of  his  patience  and  positive  cheerfulness. 


256  WILLIAM  STANTON 

The  jolting  of  the  railway  carriage  added  to  his 
pain  during  the  weary  night  and  day  to  St.  Louis. 
But  when  his  companion,  eager  for  some  means  of 
distracting  him,  introduced  to  him  a  chance  ac- 
quaintance on  the  train,  a  Jew  engaged  in  entomo- 
logical work  for  one  of  the  Government  bureaus,  Fr. 
Stanton  chatted  so  gaily  and  interestingly  for  two 
hours  that  the  man  could  scarcely  believe  that  he 
was  ill.  But  he  was  very  ill  indeed.  Reaching  St. 
Louis  almost  in  collapse,  he  was  driven  to  the  Uni- 
versity. The  next  day  he  was  taken  to  St,  John's 
Hospital,  in  desperate  condition. 

But  with  his  astonishing  vitality  he  rallied  from 
the  ill  effects  of  the  long  journey.  A  week  after 
his  entrance  into  the  hospital  he  wrote  again  to  his 
sister,  briefly  recounting  what  had  happened  since 
his  last  letter.     He  continues  then : 

"  I  wanted  to  write  sooner,  but  there  was  no  news  to 
tell  you.  A  thorough  examination  is  being  made  by 
the  best  doctors  in  the  city.  To-day  or  to-morrow  they 
will  make   an   X-ray   examination,   after   which    Dr. 

E will  make  his  diagnosis  and  we  shall  know  what 

is  the  matter  and  what  has  to  be  done  further.  Until 
the  diagnosis  is  made  we  can  only  keep  our  souls  in 
patience. 

"  I  have  every  care  and  comfort  possible  here  under 
the  kind  Sisters  of  Mercy  and  the  nurses  of  the  hos- 
pital. .  .  . 


HOMEWARD  257 

"  I  can't  write  long  without  getting  tired,  as  the 
doctors  will  not  let  me  move  out  of  bed,  so  I  must 
stop  for  the  present,  and  await  the  developments  of 
next  week.  Tell  Auntie  not  to  be  disturbed.  But  I 
want  you  all  to  make  a  novena  to  the  Blessed  Virgin, 
to  finish  on  the  feast  of  the  Presentation.  This  will 
probably  be  the  most  critical  time  for  me,  and  the  feast 
just  fits  in.  Any  little  prayers,  say,  three  Hail  Marys, 
will  do.  If  you  can  all  say  them  together  every  day, 
so  much  the  better.  .  .  ." 

His  friends  in  St.  Louis  flocked  about  him.  He 
showed  a  cheerful  countenance  to  all,  joked  and 
made  little  of  his  illness.  In  fact,  the  chief  physi- 
cian at  the  hospital  said  afterward  that  Fr.  Stanton's 
steady  courage  actually  added  to  the  dif^culty  of 
diagnosing  his  illness  properly.  But  some  of  his 
friends  sent  alarming  reports  to  his  family.  The 
last  letter  he  was  able  to  write,  a  scrawl  in  pencil, 
was  to  encourage  his  sister  and  aunt.  It  was  dated 
with  the  month  only,  but  it  must  have  been  written 
at  the  end  of  January  or  the  beginning  of  February. 

"  You  see  I  am  still  alive  and  able  to  scribble,  so  you 
need  not  bother  about  funeral  arrangements  yet.  I 
got  your  letter  yesterday,  and  am  glad  to  see  you  have 
plenty  of  common-sense  and  will  not  allow  yourself  to 

be  flurried  by  sensational  notes  from  N or  any 

one  else.  .  .  . 

"  And  how  am  I  now  ?    Well,  feeling  fairly  well  to- 


258  WILLIAM  STANTON 

day,  with  a  fair  appetite  and  not  much  pain,  getting  the 
best  of  nursing,  being  examined  carefully  and  thor- 
oughly by  the  best  specialist  in  St.  Louis.  What  more 
could  one  desire  under  my  circumstances?  My  case 
has  been  somewhat  puzzling  to  the  doctors,  and  they 
are  taking  all  possible  means  to  avoid  any  mistake; 
hence  the  apparent  delay.  Much  better  thus  than  to 
rush  at  a  radical  operation  which  might  complicate 
matters  more. 

"  They  have  concluded  not  to  perform  any  operation 
for  the  present,  thinking  the  disease  can  be  controlled 
more  easily  by  other  forms  of  treatment.  Just  what 
treatment  is  best  they  are  discussing  now.  .  .  . 

"  So  you  see,  whilst  the  wise  men  are  in  doubt  all  we 
have  to  do  is  to  be  patient  and  await  results.  In  the 
meantime,  any  number  of  nuns  and  convent  children 
and  friends  are  praying  for  me,  and  so  we  have  every 
reason  to  hope  for  success. 

"  Keep  your  soul  in  peace  then,  my  dear,  and  tell 
Auntie  not  to  worry.  Neither  of  you  could  do  a 
particle  of  good  for  me  here.  All  you  could  do  would 
be  to  visit  me  for  a  moment  or  two ;  and  a  visit  will  be 
much  more  enjoyable  when  I  meet  you  all  in  San 
Antonio  some  time  in  the  not  too  distant  future,  if 
God  wills.  .  .  ." 

However,  the  doctors  did  know  definitely  what 
his  disease  was.  They  merely  did  not  think  it  well 
to  tell  him.  As  for  an  operation,  that  was  out  of 
the  question:  there  was  no  hope:  the  cancer  had 
developed  too  far  for  that.  By  now  the  malignant 
tumours,  spreading  along  the  lymphatics,  had  filled 


HOMEWARD  259 

nearly  the  whole  of  the  abdominal  cavity,  and  were 
shortly  to  mount  up  and  attack  his  throat. 

He  had  no  fever,  nor  was  he  ever  quite  delirious. 
But  as  his  pain  and  his  weakness  increased,  his  mind 
wandered.  He  was  back  once  more  in  the  bush. 
He  cried  out  about  "  his  boys  —  his  poor  boys !  " 
He  was  labouring  through  the  swamps,  and  he  could 
not  reach  them.  But  at  any  time  the  name  of  Jesus, 
or  a  little  aspiration,  brought  him  back  to  his  senses, 
smiling,  cheerful,  praying. 

One  of  his  comrades  praised  him  for  his  courage. 
He  lifted  up  the  crucifix,  which  he  kept  always  in 
his  hands,  and  whispered,  *'  It's  not  courage,  Jim ; 
it's  faith !  "  Well,  it  was  both ;  the  one  had  become 
as  much  part  of  the  man  as  the  other. 

He  fought  against  letting  his  family  know  how 
badly  he  was.  But  toward  the  end  of  February  he 
gave  in.  They  were  informed  and  came  on  to  St. 
Louis  at  once.  The  end  was  not  far  now.  But 
how  weary  the  road  that  remained !  His  pain  grew. 
The  tumour  in  his  throat  prevented  him  from  taking 
nourishment;  he  could  only  hold  a  bit  of  ice  in  his 
mouth  and  let  it  melt.  Toward  the  end  he  could 
not  even  receive  Holy  Communion.  In  the  agony 
of  thirst  he  thought  he  was  in  the  midst  of  drouth 
back  in  Honduras.     "  Help  me  home !  "  he  cried. 


26o  WILLIAM  STANTON 

"  My  boys  are  waiting  for  me.  There  is  no  water 
in  the  town !  " 

Never  did  he  utter  a  word  of  complaint.  But  he 
writhed  and  crawled  about  his  bed  like  a  stricken 
animal  in  dumb  torment.  Men  turned  away  from 
that  tortured,  smiling  figure,  to  hide  their  tears. 

The  pain  kept  him  from  sleep.  And  through  the 
long  nights  he  prayed  quietly,  or  wandered  off  to 
talk  about  his  mission.  "  God's  will  be  done !  "  was 
always  on  his  lips,  or  "  Patience,  Jesus,  patience ! " 
Those  about  him  now  prayed  for  his  death.  But 
death  held  off.  He  was  so  strong  that  the  disease 
must  eat  him  out  to  the  last  ounce  of  resistance  be- 
fore he  could  die. 

"  Tell  me,"  he  asked,  "  Am  I  dying?  "  And  they 
told  him,  yes.  "  Well,  that's  good.  It's  good  to  go 
home !  "  And  he  asked  his  nurse  to  read  over  for 
him  the  prayers  for  the  dying.  He  talked  of  God 
and  of  heaven  as  simply  as  might  a  child.  He 
brought  heaven  into  that  chamber  of  suffering  for 
those  who  shared  it  with  him. 

And  still  death  forbore.  Only  once  he  said,  piti- 
fully, "I  am  so  long  a-dying!"  The  ashes  were 
thickening  over  the  little  flame,  but  how  brightly  the 
flame  shone  through  them.  Near  the  end,  when  his 
throat  was  choked  so  that  he  could  scarcely  whis- 


HOMEWARD  261 

per,  an  old  friend,  a  fellow  priest,  leaned  over  to 
catch  what  he  was  trying  to  say.  But  the  faint 
words,  with  a  pressure  of  the  hand,  were  only  a 
familiar  teasing  exclamation,  "  You  old  fraud !  " 

It  is  seven  years  since  he  died,  but  the  details  of 
that  last  long  waiting  for  death  are  vivid  still  in  the 
minds  of  those  who  watched  with  him.  Never  did 
he  preach  Christ  to  men  as  his  smiling  Christian 
courage  preached  Him  then. 

The  last  night,  he  asked  his  nurse  many  times, 
"  Have  we  much  farther  to  go  ?  "  Not  far,  she  told 
him,  and  fought  with  her  tears  because  she  dreaded 
that  it  might  still  be  far.  It  was  such  a  night  as  had 
been  a  dozen  before ;  when  death  hovered ;  and  one 
knew  not  if  it  would  come  or  not.  In  fact  he 
seemed  more  at  ease  than  he  had  been.  Only  the 
nurse  was  with  him.     Let  her  tell  of  the  end. 

"  At  eleven  o'clock  I  gave  him  his  medicine  hypo- 
dermically,  and  arranged  his  pillows,  and  he  slept 
fitfully.  When  I  asked  him  if  he  would  like  a  little 
piece  of  ice,  he  answered,  yes ;  but  his  voice  sounded 
differently,  and  he  did  not  talk  as  he  usually  did. 
Still  his  general  condition  seemed  better,  and  I  was 
not  alarmed.  The  Intern  came  in  occasionally,  and 
did  not  notice  any  change.  About  ten  minutes  be- 
fore midnight,  I  again  offered  him  some  ice.     He 


262  WILLIAM  STANTON 

nodded,  but  did  not  speak.  I  often  recall  the  feel- 
ing that  came  over  me  then,  as  if  some  third  person 
were  present  in  the  room ;  but  I  was  not  alarmed  at 
all,  for  I  knew  that  our  dear  Lord  was  not  far  away. 

"  I  raised  his  head.  He  did  not  try  to  help  me 
with  the  weight  as  he  usually  did.  I  saw  that  he 
was  dying.  I  called  Dr.  C ,  who  came  imme- 
diately. But  his  beautiful  pure  soul  was  then  in  the 
presence  of  Him  Whom  he  had  loved  and  served  so 
well.     He  died  without  any  struggle." 

It  was  a  little  before  midnight,  Thursday,  March 
10,  19 lo.     He  had  just  completed  his  fortieth  year. 

On  Saturday  morning,  the  feast  of  the  canoniza- 
tion of  Saint  Ignatius  and  Saint  Francis  Xavier,  the 
rector  of  the  University  celebrated  requiem  Mass 
over  the  body;  a  low  Mass,  and  no  sermon,  after 
the  custom  of  the  Jesuits.  Then  the  body  was  taken 
to  the  cemetery  at  the  Florissant  noviciate,  near  the 
city,  where  Fr.  Robison,  his  boyhood  friend  and 
comrade  in  the  Society,  read  the  last  rites,  and  con- 
signed it  to  the  grave.  The  wheel  had  come  full 
circle;  he  rested  where  he  had  begun  his  life  as  a 
Jesuit. 


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